TRENITALIA CEO and general manager, Gianpiero Strisciuglio, has announced that the passenger operating subsidiary of Italian State Railways (FS) will acquire an additional 74 Frecciarossa 1000 high-speed trains under a €2bn investment programme aiming to consolidate its position in the European high-speed sector.
According to Strisciuglio, Trenitalia aims to increase service frequency and enter new cross-border markets to provide an alternative to medium-distance air travel.
Looking to grow revenue while making the best use of existing infrastructure, Trenitialia aims to improve energy efficiency, increase load factors, and reduce operating costs per seat-km. Fleet renewal also helps reduce the risk of vehicle obsolescence, improving reliability and punctuality, the company says.
Trenitalia says that it currently has 46 Frecciarossa 1000 trains on order from Hitachi Rail, including 10 under a contract option exercised in June 2025 that is worth €287m, according to the manufacturer. Deliveries of the new fleet began last year and the fifth train entered service on February 10.
By the end of this year, Trenitalia will introduce a Milan - Munich high-speed service operated in partnership with German Rail (DB). “We will start with a journey time of 6h 30min,” Strisciuglio says. With the opening of the Brenner Base Tunnel, “we will gain an hour, resulting in significant journey time savings.”
In the domestic market, Trenitalia says that its regional fleet will be the youngest in Europe by 2027, thanks to recent investment funded by Italy’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR), with the age of the fleet averaging between five and 10 years. Over 80% or more than 1000 out of a total fleet of 1300 trains are already of the “latest generation,” according to Trenitalia, which says it will introduce over 30 bi-mode battery and electric trains on inter-city services.
Strisciuglio says that Trenitalia is also focusing on improving onboard connectivity, one of the most frequent requests made by its passengers. The company has already successfully tested a proprietary 5G network on the Turin - Milan route, which it says has delivered “excellent performance,” and is also examining the potential of using the Starlink satellite network to provide 100% coverage.
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