There is a dab of magic every time a Freccia Rossa arrives at an Italian train station. Ignoring the unceremonious, crumbling infrastructure of the Rome terminal, it rolls in silently, elegantly grooved and carrying a futuristic charm. The Freccia Rossa, the newest generation of Italian high-speed trains, has done the impossible: it has made rail travel sexy. Moving at up to 300 km/h (186 mph), it can make the trip between Rome and Milan in just two hours and fifty-five minutes. Per passenger, the train produces 80% less CO2 than an airplane covering the same distance. The trains are designed and produced by Consorzio TREVI, a conglomerate of Italian companies including world-famous heavyweights like Fiat and Finmeccanica.
Trenitalia, the recently privatized rail company that manages everything from commuter lines to the high-speed Freccia Rossa service, is one of the most successful former state enterprises in Italy. While other former state mammoths, namely the telecommunications leader Telecom Italia and the massive electric utility conglomerate Enel, are mired in debt, Trenitalia has managed to carve out a significant role in the sprawling European rail network. The company promises an unparalleled service for travelers, a lesser environmental impact than any other form of travel and strong opportunities for Italian manufacturers and service providers. While the rest of Italy’s industries struggle to modernize, how did rail manage to reach such sophistication? The strategy of privatizing state industries, paired with continued government support, has made Trenitalia the poster child of the Italian state-economic model.
The Italian rail system hasn’t always been idyllic. In an attempt to raise support after the 1922 March on Rome, Mussolini capitalized on public discontent over unreliable trains and promised to fix the problem. The fascist slogan “He made the trains run on time” persists, but the resurgence of Italian rail under Mussolini was short-lived. Trains soon became the last hope mean of travel, meant for those who had plenty of time to spare in stalled, antiquated locomotives. By the 1970s and 80s, amid Italy’s struggle with a bloated bureaucracy, trains and stations were in constant disrepair. Trenitalia has only caught up with its French, German and Spanish high-speed counterparts in the last decade, after making a set of structural changes that pitted the company against both the Italian love for cars and the increasingly crippled airline industry. This change in direction was heralded by the EU-wide privatization of rail systems in the early 2000s, which designated Trenitalia as a competitive industry leader, rather than a mass employer. This implied monumental struggles with unionized workers on trains and stations, as well as those building and maintaining tracks. The early stages of Trenitalia’s privatization were plagued with such issues, culminating in fears of the entire network’s collapse in 2006.
“Privatization” may be a strong word for how Italy’s trains moved forward. Despite formally relinquishing its monopoly on rail, the Italian government still holds significant shares in both Trenitalia and its subsidiaries. As is often the case with infrastructure, state support was pivotal for progress, with the Italian government infusing several rail-related projects with cash as early as the 1980s. The Freccia Rossa, or “Red Arrow,” spearhead of the Italian high-speed rail system, had completed testing as early as 1990, when a scathing review said the ultramodern train project could be “more easily admired… as an example of unrealized Italian high-speed capacities,” demonstrating deep-seated cynicism over Italian rail’s ability to modernize. The same article also mentions the high-speed track between Florence and Rome, which by then had spent more than two decades in construction; at the time, it seemed plausible that the project would never be completed. The massive investments that established the modern Italian rail industry were by and large ridiculed as an attempt to replicate successful high-speed systems elsewhere in Europe, namely France’s equally state-dependent TGV. Only unwavering support from the Ministry of Transportation allowed the deeply flawed projects to move forward, often taking decades to show results. Critics argue that a ‘truly’ privatized company would never have had the economic lifeline that the Italian government provided, and its prohibitive costs would have likely received little traction in today’s hostile economic environment. Despite the boundless criticism for the runaway spending of the Italian government, the success of Trenitalia is a prime example of how lavish state contributions to industry growth can pay off in the long run.
There is nothing incidental about the ever-growing plans for the Italian railway system. Support for it has gradually snuffed focus on other state-dependent enterprises, namely the fledgling national airline, Alitalia. In focusing on the rail industry, the Italian government has allowed Trenitalia to “leech off all routes that take less than four hours by train,” which now includes most of the Italian mainland. In a few years’ time, there may not be any conventional (i.e. non low-cost) flights on the Rome-Milan business axis, as the train system has decimated all hopes of reviving Alitalia domestically. Whereas Berlusconi, in his days as Prime Minister, bailed out the airline, government officials now see this move as little else than a weak appeal to nationalism. The growing influence of the E.U. in the nation means that new expansion efforts – pushing the high-speed line up from Verona into Austria, as well as making a high-speed link between Torino and Lyon, France – have begun despite little to nonexistent public interest. Although the Italian affinity for bureaucracy has occasionally landed it in hot water, in the case of rail it has helped maintain long-term projects that lacked immediate appeal. While Italy’s government is at a loss on how to fix its current economic malaise, its long-term project of high-speed rail expansion reflects its strong capacity for foresight.
In 2013, Italy has had little reason to celebrate. Its interim government was nearly toppled after elections failed to demonstrate a clear winner, and its youth unemployment rate has reached a record 40%. Of the few things President Napolitano can garner as a sign of progress is the ETR-1000, the new Freccia Rossa train that will make the trip between Rome and Milan in just 2 hours and 20 minutes. It solidifies Trenitalia as a global leader in its field, albeit with methods that the E.U. recently judged as reeking of lack of oversight and noncompetitive policies. It seems unbelievable that the same cocktail of policies – privatization, unrelenting government spending and bureaucratic zeal – can have such dire effects for the nation as a whole, but can be such a boon to one key industry. With Trenitalia, Italy has clearly found the right mix of state support and competition-minded policy. Its task now will be to apply what is quintessentially the “Italian model” to other fledgling sectors.