Turin (Torino) is the city that invented Italian automotive culture — FIAT was founded here in 1899, Lancia in 1906, Alfa Romeo moved here for a period, and the Lingotto factory (the one with the test track on the roof) is the most iconic Italian industrial building of the 20th century. And yet Turin's public transport is the most sophisticated in Italy after Milan, with a fully automated metro, an extensive tram network with historic vehicles, and a city geography that makes walking and cycling genuinely practical. The car city, transit-first.
Read the guide →Turin's Metro Line 1 (GTT — Gruppo Torinese Trasporti, gtt.to.it) is the first fully automated driverless metro in Italy — opened in 2006, extended progressively to its current 23 stations and 15.1km length. The VAL (Véhicule Automatique Léger) technology is French-origin (developed by Matra/Siemens) but the implementation in Turin was the first Italian application. The specific character: the trains are smaller than conventional metro (narrow-body, 104 passengers per car), the stations are designed with a consistent architectural language by architects including Kengo Kuma (who designed the Stazione Porta Susa connection), and the fully automated operation means no driver cabin — the first car has a panoramic forward view through the front windscreen, the most entertaining public transport seating in Italy.
The Line 1 route connects the Stazione Porta Susa (the main central Turin railway station, designed by AREP and Agence Architecture, opened 2013 — the most architecturally significant recent Italian railway station) and the Stazione Porta Nuova (the older main station) at the centre, and extends north to Fermi (the scientific research district) and south to Bengasi (a residential suburb). For visitors: the central stations most useful are Porta Susa (arrival point from Milan and other high-speed trains), Porta Nuova (the main transit hub), and Castro Pretorio (for the Quadrilatero Romano neighbourhood aperitivo circuit). Single ticket: €1.70 (valid 90 minutes, usable on any GTT vehicle — metro, tram, bus), day pass €4.50.
The GTT network (gtt.to.it — the app provides real-time information, route planning, and ticket purchase): single ticket €1.70 (90 minutes, all vehicles), daily pass €4.50, 2-day pass €7. Available at: GTT information points (Porta Nuova and Porta Susa stations), tobacco shops (tabaccherie — the "T" sign), newspaper kiosks, and the GTT app. Validate on boarding (yellow machines on trams and buses; turnstiles at metro station entrances). The specific visitor routes: from Porta Nuova railway station to the historic centre (Piazza San Carlo, Via Roma): Metro Line 1 to Re Umberto station (2 stops) or Tram 13/15/16 from Piazza Carlo Felice (adjacent to Porta Nuova). From Porta Susa to Lingotto: Tram 1 or 18 south (40 minutes) or the Metro to Bengasi and then bus. From the centre to the Museo Egizio (the Egyptian collection — the most important visit in Turin): Metro to Re Umberto, then 5 minutes on foot.
Turin's public transport (GTT — Gruppo Torinese Trasporti, gtt.to.it): single ticket €1.70 (valid 90 minutes on metro, tram, and bus), day pass €4.50. Buy at GTT points in major stations, tobacco shops (tabaccherie), newspaper kiosks, or the GTT app. Validate immediately on boarding — yellow machines on trams and buses, turnstiles at metro. The Metro Line 1 (fully automated, driverless) connects Porta Susa and Porta Nuova stations to the city residential areas. The tram network is the most extensive historical option, with 18 lines and the historic Ventotto 1928 trams on selected routes. For the historic tram experience: check the GTT app for real-time vehicle type information on each route — when a Ventotto is running, it's indicated by the vehicle number in the route listing.
Turin's Metro Line 1 (Linea 1, GTT) is Italy's first fully automated driverless metro — opened 2006, currently 23 stations and 15.1km. The VAL technology produces narrow-body trains (smaller than conventional metro) with a fully automated operation that means the first car has an unobstructed panoramic view through the front windscreen — the most entertaining seat in Italian public transport. The station architecture uses a consistent design language with natural light penetration and contemporary materials. The specific culturally significant station: the Stazione Porta Susa connection (designed by Kengo Kuma, the Japanese architect, as part of the €1.2 billion Porta Susa regeneration project) — the most architecturally significant metro interior in Italy. The fare is the same as all GTT tickets: €1.70/90 minutes.
Turin is paradoxically a city that built the Italian car industry and also demonstrates that car use can be reduced in a major Italian city. The Zone a Traffico Limitato (ZTL — limited traffic zones) cover the central historic area; residents' electric vehicles are exempt while tourist cars must park at the edge and use public transport. The cycling infrastructure (piste ciclabili — cycling paths) along the river Po embankment (the Lungo Po — the most pleasant cycling route in the city, connecting Piazza Vittorio Veneto to the Valentino park) is genuinely good by Italian standards. The rental bike service (Tobike, tobike.it) operates from approximately 70 stations across the city; €1 per 30 minutes. For a visitor arriving by train at Porta Susa or Porta Nuova: the metro and tram network reaches every significant tourist destination in Turin without requiring a car. The FIAT 500 is at the Museo dell'Automobile (Via Cernaia 40, €15 — the most important automobile museum in Italy, covering the complete history of Italian car design). You don't need a car to see the city that made cars. Related: Turin guide, Milan tram guide.
GTT app download and Metro Line 1 orientation, Ventotto tram sighting guide, Lingotto tram route, and the Po riverside cycling path for the evening hours.
La Redazione di TourLeaderPro.comItalian superstition is not irrational — it is the survival of specific pre-Christian and early Christian ritual practices that have been maintained by domestic tradition for 2,000+ years. Understanding the main Italian superstition vocabulary makes the country more legible:
Il malocchio (the evil eye): The belief that envy, expressed consciously or unconsciously through a look, can cause harm to the person envied. The malocchio protection system: the cornetto (a small red horn-shaped charm, typically worn as a necklace pendant or hung in the car or the home), the corna gesture (extending the index and little fingers while curling the middle and ring fingers — both a protective ward and an insult depending on context and direction), and specific regional rituals for diagnosing and removing the malocchio (the most common: dripping olive oil into water — if the drop disperses, the malocchio is present; if it maintains its round form, the person is unaffected). The malocchio belief is particularly strong in southern Italy (Campania, Puglia, Basilicata, Calabria, Sicily) and is often maintained by people who would describe themselves as entirely rational in other contexts. Touching iron (toccare ferro): The Italian equivalent of "knock on wood" — touching iron (not wood, specifically iron) when mentioning something good that might be jinxed by the mention. The iron reference: in the ancient Roman religious tradition, iron was the material of the ploughshare (sacred to Ceres, the grain goddess) and was considered both protective and good-fortune-associated. "Tocca ferro" is said when making a statement that could attract bad luck (e.g., "I've never been in a car accident — tocca ferro"). Friday the 17th (not Friday the 13th): The unlucky combination in Italy is Friday the 17th — because in Roman numerals, XVII is an anagram of VIXI ("I have lived" — the Latin past tense signifying death). Italian buildings with 17 floors often skip the 17th floor designation (going from 16 to 18); the Alitalia airline historically had no row 17; the number is avoided in addresses and room numbers by supersitious Italians. Friday the 13th is specifically a northern European and American superstition — the Italian version is different.
The malocchio (literally "evil eye") is the Italian belief that a look expressing envy or admiration — particularly toward children, pregnant women, and beautiful or successful people — can cause harm to the subject. The concept is ancient (documented in Roman literature, the Greek βασκανία/baskania) and maintained in contemporary Italian culture primarily in the South. Protection: the cornetto (the red horn charm, available throughout Italy as a pendant, keyring, or household decoration); the corna hand gesture (little finger and index finger extended — both protective ward and obscene gesture depending on context); and specific ritual diagnosis and removal (olive oil in water, regional ritual formulas transmitted within families, typically from grandmother to granddaughter). The malocchio is not considered superstition by its practitioners — it is a practical diagnostic system for explaining and remedying specific types of bad luck and physical ailment (headache, nausea, inexplicable fatigue).
The Italian morning market (mercato rionale) is the most directly authentic Italian cultural experience available — no tourism organisation, no guidebook staging, no English-language interpretation. Just the city's residents buying their food from the producers and merchants who have been supplying them for generations. The specific markets worth knowing:
Bologna Quadrilatero (Tuesday–Saturday, 7am–1pm): The most beautiful Italian urban food market — the medieval street grid between Piazza Maggiore and Via Rizzoli, with the market stalls of the most celebrated food city in Italy. The specific Bologna market products: the mortadella (the original large-diameter cooked pork sausage, DOP since 1998, available from the specialist vendors at La Baita cheesemonger in the quadrilatero — the most complete Bologna food shop, Via Pescherie Vecchie 3a); the tortellini in brodo available from the market-side rosticceria (hot food counter) at 11am; and the Parmigiano-Reggiano wheel sections sold directly by the producers who bring them to the Quadrilatero on Saturday morning. The best food market in Italy for the combination of product quality and architectural setting. Catania La Pescheria (Monday–Saturday, 7–11am): The most performatively theatrical fish market in Italy — the vendors in the Piazza del Duomo fish market section shout, negotiate, and display simultaneously. The specific product: the swordfish brought from the Strait of Sicily, the sea urchins (ricci di mare) served raw in the shell at the market edge, and the specific local fish vocabulary (the Catanese names for fish differ from the Italian standard — ask "come si chiama in catanese?" for the local name). Mercato di Porta Palazzo, Turin (Tuesday–Friday morning, Saturday all day): The largest open-air market in Europe (by vendor count — approximately 800 daily vendors in the Piazza della Repubblica) and the most culturally diverse market in Italy — the market reflects Turin's specific immigration history (Moroccan, Senegalese, Chinese, and southern Italian communities all have specific sections). The Porta Palazzo market also has the most complete selection of Piedmontese agricultural products outside the Langhe production zone itself: white truffles in season (October–December), Barolo and Barbaresco producers at direct-to-consumer prices, and the specific Piedmontese winter vegetables (cardoons, the specific Castelfranco radicchio, and the mostarda piemontese).
Italy's best markets: Bologna Quadrilatero (Via Pescherie Vecchie and adjacent streets, Tuesday–Saturday 7am–1pm — the finest urban food market in Italy, mortadella, tortellini, Parmigiano at the source); Catania La Pescheria (Piazza del Duomo area, Monday–Saturday 7–11am — the most theatrical fish market, swordfish and sea urchins directly from the fishermen); Turin Porta Palazzo (Piazza della Repubblica, Tuesday–Saturday — the largest open-air market in Europe, Piedmontese agricultural products and truffle season); Rome Campo de' Fiori (Piazza Campo de' Fiori, Monday–Saturday morning — the most centrally accessible Rome market, though increasingly tourist-oriented); and the Rialto Market Venice (Pescheria — fish, Tuesday–Saturday 7am–noon, the most historically continuous Italian market site, in the same location since the 13th century).
Italy has the oldest and some of the finest botanical gardens in the world — the first university botanical gardens were founded in Pisa and Padua in 1544–1545, creating the model that spread to every European university in the subsequent century. The most important:
Orto Botanico di Padova (1545, UNESCO 1997): The oldest surviving university botanical garden in the world, founded by the Padua medical school for growing medicinal plants. The original circular garden design (the hortus conclusus surrounded by a circular wall with four entry points, representing the four seasons and the four humors) is intact and is one of the finest examples of Renaissance garden design in Italy. The garden contains approximately 6,000 plant species; the most famous individual: the Goethe's Palm (a Phoenix dactylifera date palm planted in 1585 that Goethe visited in 1786 and wrote about in his Italian Journey, connecting its structure to his theory of plant metamorphosis). The 1585 palm and the 1595 Victoria regia pool (the giant water lily, one of the first specimens cultivated in Europe) are the two most visited individual plants. Entry €10, open daily, ortobotanicopd.it. Orto Botanico di Palermo: The most beautiful botanical garden in Italy for its tropical character — the Mediterranean climate of Palermo allows outdoor cultivation of tropical species that require greenhouses elsewhere. The Ficus macrophylla (the Moreton Bay fig, planted in 1845 — the aerial roots extending over 4,000 m², the most extensive single-tree root system in Europe, visible from the garden entrance) is the most extraordinary tree in Italy. Entry €5, open daily. Giardino Botanico Hanbury, Ventimiglia (Liguria): The most diverse in plant species — founded in 1867 by Thomas Hanbury (a British merchant who made his fortune in Shanghai and retired to the Ligurian coast), with 5,800 plant species from the world's Mediterranean-climate zones (California, Australia, South Africa, Chile, and the Mediterranean basin) all growing in the same coastal garden. Entry €9, open daily except Tuesday, jardinhanbury.com.
Italy's most significant botanical gardens: Orto Botanico di Padova (1545, UNESCO — the world's oldest surviving university botanical garden, Goethe's Palm planted 1585, €10); Orto Botanico di Palermo (the most beautiful for tropical character, the Ficus macrophylla with 4,000 m² root system, €5); Giardino Botanico Hanbury near Ventimiglia (5,800 species from all Mediterranean-climate world zones, €9); Villa Taranto botanical garden on Lake Maggiore (the most deliberately comprehensive 20th-century botanical collection in Italy, 20,000 species including the Victoria regia, €12, Verbania Pallanza); and the Orto Botanico di Roma (Largo Cristina di Svezia 24, Rome — 8,000 species in the Trastevere hill, €8, the most accessible Italian botanical garden from a major tourist destination).