On February 14 2010 the new Florence Tramway will be inaugurated at last. After five years of construction and a part of the citizens against the project, the first line of this new public transportation system will be active.
I am pro-tramway, I think that the tramway will improve the citizens’ quality of life, as it’s cheap, ecologic, very fast (sure faster than bus) and should even be always on time (here in Italy punctuality of public services is a strange thing…).
Line 1 will connect the southern part of the city to the centre of Florence, and soon will be built lines 2 and 3, connecting other parts of the city.
I hope that a new, efficient and diffused public transportation system will encourage Florentines to leave the car in their garages and move around with public mass transport. Florence has a real traffic problem, traffic jams at rush hours, even if the historical centre has some limitations to car traffic, is still chocking because of too many cars. So a new mass transportation system is not an option, but a real need.
Line 1 starts at Scandicci, enters the city of Florence and runs over via Nenni, viale Talenti and via del Sansovino. After Piazza Paolo Uccello crosses the Arno River with a brand new bridge and enter the Cascine park. From Piazza Vittorio Veneto continues to Viale Fratelli Rosselli, Via Jacopo da Diacceto and Via Alamanni. Here will soon rejoins the path of Line 2 to Santa Maria Novella train station.
The races on weekdays, when fully implemented (April 2010), will be every 3.5 minutes during rush hours, every 6 minutes during the normal hours and every 12 minutes during the late evening.
I’d like to participate to the very first ride of the tramway!
Florence is not so big, and the historical centre can be easily visited by foot, that’s the best way to enjoy the streets and the atmosphere of the city, but there is a good public transportation service which is useful to cover distances in a short time and have more time to dedicate to the city.
There are several kind of buses: the city bus is called “autobus”, the regional coaches are called “Pullman”.
Ataf buses are the city lines, and cover almost every corner of the city. In the historical centre there are also small electric buses with circular paths (Li-Nea) that can be used with the same ticket of the normal buses.
You can buy the tickets in every newsstand and tobacco shops (see the sign with the “T”) and then validate on bus; the normal ticket costs 1,20 euro and lasts 90 minutes. There are also daily tickets (5 euros), 3 day tickets (12 euros) and “carta agile”, a card with 10 tickets for 10 euros. You can also buy the ticket on the bus (just ask the driver) but the cost is higher (2 euros). The most part of the lines stops at Santa Maria Novella Station and Piazza San Marco.
For the tourists there’s City Sightseeing Tour bus service, with daily tickets and two different lines and multilingual guides that allows you to tour the city seeing the most important tourist attractions and hop on and off to visit what you want. Tickets can be bought on board.
To get out of Florence use the coaches: Lazzi, Sita and Cap. The bus station is right behind Santa Maria Novella Train Station.
To get to Florence Airport you can use the shuttle: departures every 30 minutes from 6.00 to 23.00, the shuttle will take you right in front of Santa Maria Novella Station and back. The single ticket is called "Volainbus" and costs 5 euros, 8 euros if you want the return ticket too.
Today I’m going to tell you about another city in Tuscany, less famous than Firenze, but really interesting from a touristic point of view: Livorno.
That’s the city where I was born! I moved to Florence when I was 20 but my family still lives in Livorno and I often go back to my beautiful natal city.
Livorno is on the coast known as the Etruscan Coast, about 90 kilometres from Firenze, from which you can easily reach by train or car in about 1 hour and half. It’s just 20 kilometres far from Pisa, and the two cities are kind of enemies from centuries.
Livorno was a small port and village until Ferdinando I de’ Medici decided to found here a new city, an ideal perfect city according to the renaissance theories. Soon Livorno became the main port of Tuscany, and people from all over the world came here: merchants, sailors, exiled and refugees for political or religious reasons. That’s because Ferdinando I enacted a law that opened up the city to everyone who wanted to live and work here, no matter their nationality, religion or if they where exiled from other countries.
Livorno became a melting pot of cultures, religions and thoughts. Jews were not contained into a ghetto, indeed they were powerful, rich and attained important political positions. Other communities living in Livorno came from Greece, Germany, France, Netherlands, England, Armenia, Eastern Europe, Asia and Muslim Countries, each one free to establish its own church, cemetery and schools. Still today the city is very opened to the difference (in culture, art, politic and society) and tolerance and respect are very important values.
The city is rich in history and architecture, as you can see from my pictures, from late renaissance to baroque, then neo-classicism and even some exquisite art nouveau buldings. The historical neighbourhood of Venezia Nuova (“New Venice”) was built in the early 1600 and is very characteristic, thanks to its water canals that surround small islands and that were used to transport goods from the port to the storehouses placed in the lower level of the palaces.
Plus there’s a beautiful long waterside with sidewalks, gardens and a wonderful terrace on the sea.
At the south edge of the city starts a wonderful panoramic road, il Romito, that runs on the top of an impressive cliff that falls down in the sea; here you can find one of the most fascinating and wild places to enjoy the sea. Not sandy beaches, but colourful rocks, crystal waters and lots of sealife to admire while snorkelling.
Don’t forget the pleasure of tasting the local cuisine, made of fresh seafood that reflects the multi-cultural influences of the city, and that is considered the best in Tuscany and one of the best in Italy. The local dishes are made with the “poor” fish, those species of fishes that could not be sold at the market and ended in the fisherman’s pan. Less noble but cheaper and super-tasty!!!
I highly recommend you to visit Livorno, discover the fascinating story of the city, enjoy the beautiful sea, and taste one of the best Italian sea cuisine!
The first time I saw the snow in Florence was 2005, and then it happened again! I took those few pictures the night of december 20th, when the snow was beginning to fall... it was really amazing, such a magical feeling watching the snow flakes falling over Santa Maria Novella!
The next morning I drove to my parent's house for Christmas, on a snowy and icy highway... end of the magic! :-(
the inner court of Palazzo dei Vicari, Scarperia
You can see the tour of my daytrip in Mugello in this post!
Scarperia is a small village in the heart of Mugello, known for the handcraft of knives, and is one of the most beautiful villages of Italy (see the site of Borghitalia to discover all the most beutiful villages of Italy!).
Scarperia was founded around 1300, when Firenze decided to build a fortified town to control Mugello, and had to fight against the Ubaldini family, the ancient feudatories of Mugello.
Scarperia is a very nice village, very interesting from an historical point of view, but it’s not so exceptional, considering all the beautiful villages in Tuscany.
What is really interesting is the Palazzo dei Vicari, (see this post about it!) a beautiful palace built in 1300, destroyed twice after earthquakes and always rebuilt.
Also the small village of Sant’Agata, very near Scarperia, is really nice and characteristic (much more than Scarperia itself), and the church of Sant’Agata is a precious ancient Romanesque building.
In the next post I’ll show you Sant’Agata, but now… here are the pictures of Scarperia, and here’s the main post with all the details of my daytrip in Mugello.
This Medici villa is located in the nearbies of Florence, in the Mugello region, a wonderful corner of quiet tuscan countryside.
Villa del Trebbio is really ancient, but in 1428 Cosimo de’ Medici completely renovated and enlarged it; the architect is Michelozzo (the same of Cafaggiolo and Palazzo Medici).
This villa was surrounded by forests and agricultural estate, and even if it looks like a fortified castle, it was a place of pleasure and rest for the Medici family. Today the castle is surrounded by a beautiful cypress wood with more than one century old trees.
Unfortunately today this villa is private, and visits can be booked just in some special occasions.
You can see the tour of my daytrip in Mugello in this post!
The next stop of my trip in Mugello was the castle of Cafaggiolo, one of the most ancient of the Medici villas.
It was originally a military building in order to defend the area. In 1428 was restructured by Michelozzo, on assignment of Cosimo the Old. Michelozzo changed the fortress into a delightful villa for restoring vacations of the Medici family, especially in the summer, but the villa still has the typical aspect of a military castle.
Lorenzo il Magnifico spent his summer here in Cafaggiolo when he was a boy, and always loved this place in a special way.
When I’ve been there unfortunately the villa was closed because of restorations, so I just could admire it from the outside, but it worth anyway, the villa is so beautiful…
To reach the castle of Cafaggiolo reach San Piero a Sieve, and follow the signs to Barberino nel Mugello, you’ll soon see the villa on your left.
You can see the tour of my daytrip in Mugello in this post :-)
Here is Piazzale degli Uffizi, the long narrow square surruonded by the Uffizi Gallery. More infos on the Uffizi Museum are in this post :-)
Other pictures and descripion of Orsanmichele can be found in this post! ;-)
The National Central Library of Florence is the biggest library of Italy and one of the biggest of whole Europe.
The library was founded in 1714 by Antonio Magliabechi, who donated his collection of 30,000 volumes to the city of Florence. By 1743 it was required that a copy of every work published in Tuscany be submitted to the library.
In 1861 its holdings were combined with those of the Biblioteca Palatina, and since 1870 the library has collected copies of all Italian publications.
Originally the collections were keeped in some rooms of the Uffizi Gallery, but since 1935 the library have been housed in a building designed by Cesare Bazzaniu and V. Mazzei, located along the Arno River in Santa Croce.
Unfortunately, a major flood of the Arno River in 1966 damaged nearly one-third of the library's holdings, most notably its periodicals and Palatine and Magliabechi collections. The Restoration Center was subsequently established and saved many of these priceless books. However, much work remains to be done and some items are forever lost.
The Loggia del Porcellino, or Loggia del Mercato Nuovo, is located in the heart of Florence, just behind Ponte Vecchio.
Here are some picture i took during my last walk in the historical centre of Florence, in an incredibly hot afternoon... this summer Florence had been really hot, this is one of the hottest summers since 200 years... hope fall comes soon!
The fountain of Neptune is the first public fountain in Florence, it was completed in 1575 and rise in piazza della Signoria, (read this post about Piazza della Signoria!) just in front of Palazzo Vecchio, in the heart of the public life of Florence.
Some years before, Cosimo I de’ Medici assigned the work to Bartolomeo Ammannati, who realized a big representation of the Florentines dominion over the sea (Cosimo had just founded the seaport of Livorno).
The statue is made of whie Carrara marble and it’ quite big, so the Florentines call him “il Biancone”, that means “the big white”. Under Neptune there are his horses, and then a lot of more bronze statues representing sea gods, satyrs, and marine creatures.
During the years this fountain had bad luck: Florentines never liked it too much, it had been used as a basin for laundry, a satyr had been stolen during 1830 carnival, and had been damaged and vandalized several times.
But Biancone still resist!
the inner court of Palazzo Strozzi
the installation of contemporary art in the inner court of Palazzo Strozzi
facade of Palazzo Strozzi
Calcio Fiorentino is an early form of football that originated in 16th century in Florence, Italy. Today Calcio Fiorentino is still played in Florence. The matches used to take place in Piazza Santa Croce, and still do, every third week of June.
In this game are used both feet and hands, it’s a kind of mix between soccer, rugby and Greco-roman wrestling. Goals can be scored by throwing the ball over a designated spot on the perimeter of the field. The playing field is a giant sand pit with a goal running the width of each end.
Four historical neighbourhoods of the city, represented from their main church and a colour (Santa Croce is blue, San Giovanni is green, Santo Spirito is white, and Santa Maria Novella is red), fight against each other to win.
The modern version allows tactics such as head-butting, punching, elbowing, and choking, but forbids sucker-punching and kicks to the head.
It’s a very violent sport but also spectacular, especially because of the pre-game parade with historically accurate Renaissance costumes, and sure, for the fights!!!
If you’re going to visit Florence in late June don’t miss the Calcio Fiorentino Match!
Colonna dell'Abbondanza, the exact place where cardo and decumanus used to meet in the roman city of Florence
the big arch of Piazza della Repubblica from the back