On July 16, 2023, the Italian government unveiled a new direct train service from Rome to the famed ruins of Pompeii, located in the southern Campania region. Prior to this new service, there wasn’t a direct route connecting the two cities, and this new service is expected to double the archaeological site’s visitors. Here’s everything you need to know about the new direct train from Rome to Pompeii.
The new direct train route will currently only operate on the third Sunday of each month. The next service dates will be August 20, September 17, and October 20. The train will take approximately one hour and 57 minutes in each direction, with the train leaving Rome at 8:43 a.m. and returning at 6:40 p.m. The train will also connect to Rome Fiumicino airport, where most international flights land. This means that tourists will be able to directly take a train to Pompeii after landing.
The current public transportation route from Rome to Pompeii is complicated and long. Visitors must first arrive in Naples via train, where they can then change onto the Circumvesuviana, a coastal regional service that makes several stops around the Gulf of Naples. The journey from Naples to the Pompeii Scavi-Villa dei Misteri train station can take at least two hours.
Pompeii was an affluent ancient Roman city that was buried beneath 14 to 17 feet of ash and pumice after the nearby Mt. Vesuvius, a volcano that is still active today, catastrophically erupted in 79 A.D. The ash and pumice acted as a remarkable preservative – when the city was rediscovered and excavated in the 18th century, archaeologists noticed that houses, mosaics, jewelry, statues, frescoes, loaves of bread, wood, and even the imprints of animals and humans in their final moments were preserved in stunning detail. Today, two-thirds of the city has been excavated, and visitors can wander the ancient streets as the Pompeiians did over 1,900 years ago.
The high-speed rail from the capital is expected to double visitor numbers to the ancient site, which on average sees 20,000 visitors a day A large pedestrian path to the archaeological area is also set to be created to streamline attendance into the park that will allow for the ancient city to be open at night and feature shows and events held beneath the moon and stars. Pompeii recently reopened a local museum that had been closed for 40 years to exhibit artifacts discovered in 2021.
Asia London Palomba
Asia London Palomba is a trilingual freelance journalist from Rome, Italy. In the past, her work on culture, travel, and history has been published in The Boston Globe, Atlas Obscura, The Christian Science Monitor, and Grub Street, New York Magazine's food section. In her free time, Asia enjoys traveling home to Italy to spend time with family and friends, drinking Hugo Spritzes, and making her nonna's homemade cavatelli.