Insurance News Archive

High-speed trains to boost Italian property

The expansion of Italy's high-speed train service, TAV, will have a significant impact on the value of real estate, one of the country's leading transport experts has suggested.

A new high-speed route running between Rome and Naples is now nearing completion, with two further routes - Turin to Milan and Milan to Rome - on track to begin services by 2009.

And according to Carlo de Vito, TAV supervisor for all of Italy's 2,400 train stations, the expansion of the transport network will have a positive impact on real estate by making key urban areas more accessible to the travelling public.

"When we open a new station there is a 30 to 40 percent rise in real estate values in just a few years," the International Herald Tribune quoted Mr de Vito as saying. "A new station near the centre of a big city makes that area more appealing to the middle class [who are] willing to commute."

This trend embodies the so-called 'Ryanair effect' - whereby the arrival of low-cost airlines drives up property values - and areas such as Bologna, Naples and Florence are expected to be among the biggest benefactors.

Once completed, the high-speed links will cut travelling time between Turin and Milan from an hour and a half to just 50 minutes.

12 Dec 2007