Rail Europe says that we cannot reserve seats for the local train (venice to milan) from the US but we have to go to venice station to get seats. DO we really need to do this or should we be ok without?

Hi C,

There are ES* trains which come with reserved seats. You can buy the tickets online at www.trenitalia.com.

They are only 2E more than the IC, which is less than the cost of the seat reservation on the IC.

Yu can't get reserved seats on AR or R trains.

Are you traveling on a railpass or something? If you buy tickets online at www.trenitalia.com you can definitely reserve your seat. There are several different sorts of trains that run between Venice and Milan and you can reserve seats on almost all of them

When you say "local" do you mean "slower" or "local in Italy"?

Local, slower trains, labeled D or R do not allow reservations.

Faster trains--recommended for the trip between Milan and Venice--are labeled IC or ES. ES comes with reservations automatically. IC has an opttional reservation feature.

If you want to reserve seats, use the Italian rail site trenitalia.com. You problem reserving may be a problem with RailEurope. I would recommend reservations if you are traveling on a Friday, weekend, or holiday.

Maybe it is D or R. I cannot tell from the railpass site. It is a 7:52 am train on Mayy 9 from Venice to Milan. Thanks for the help!

Trenitalia lists this train as an IC train.

1st class: 29.08 euros
2nd class: 23.16 euros

You can reserve a seat for I think 3 euros extra. Otherwise you may have to battle with others for an open seat. First class may involve less battling for free seats.

Where else are you traveling? Are you sure you need a railpass?