Driving In Italy part 1— Goodbye Dolce Vita

The next few installments will cover driving in Italy. We will examine the main rules of the road, provide tips for country, city and highway driving as well as gassing up, parking, tolls, important street signs, avoiding speed traps, dealing with fines and car rental surcharges. Cars are the lifeblood of the villa rental business and 95% of all vacation rentals in Italy require a car. What helped make America great was the car. It gives us independence and freedom to go wherever we want whenever we choose. The same applies to vacationing in Italy. Unless you plan to confine yourself strictly to cities, it is, at best, cumbersome, if not downright impossible to explore the magnificent countryside by any other means.

Italy has gone through many changes over the last decade, none of them appeal to me. I remember driving a fancy Audi V8 from Rome to Naples at 265km per hour — that’s roughly 165 mph — in the rain! It was one of the most exhilarating feelings I’ve ever experienced. The car gripped the road like a tiger and the entire drive took not much more than an hour. Speed limits were more like suggestions back then. Those days — sadly for me — are long gone. Hardly any Italians exceed speed limits anymore. Everyone wears seat belts and maintains daytime running lights.

The roads have become homogenized. Why did this happen? Italy devised a devilishly devious scheme — each driver is given 20 points when they receive a license. Every time Italians are caught breaking the law they lose four or five points depending on the infraction. Lose all your points and it may take up to two years of bureaucratic maneuvers to reapply for drivers education, driving tests, permits and all that’s required to get back on the road. The best part is that they do not even know when it happens. Most infractions are recorded electronically followed by bad news in the mail.

Americans and citizens of non European nations are unaffected for the moment, the most we get is a fine. So, these days the few speeders on Italian highways are most likely foreigners in rental cars. To Italians that’s like rubbing salt in an open wound. It’s actually worse in other places. Some Scandinavians are being fined up to 10% of their annual income for a speeding violation. The EU is giddily looking into this for all its member nations.

However, Italians are an ingenious lot. Since most infractions are caught on hidden cameras and first generation equipment lacked good resolution, crafty Italians resorted to paying elders and nursing home residents to falsely claim they were driving at that particular moment. So what if the seniors lost points? They no longer drove, each senior was good for at least four violations and the extra cash didn’t hurt. That’s over too. I’m not sure if the cameras got sharper or the Italians just ran out of seniors with valid licenses. For awhile, citizens of Naples tried wearing (and selling) t-shirts with a seat belt painted on just to avoid latching up. That ended as well. Big Brother’s iron boot has slammed the brakes on Italy’s daredevil antics. I hope to demonstrate how this translates into good news for you.