Returning Rental car in Florence
 

I need to return a rental car in Florence on a Sunday. I am looking for a location that will be easy (relatively) to get to coming from the south AND will be close to the train station or easy to get to the train station (walking is fine - we will only have backpacks). We want to drop the car, stash bags at the train station and wander Florence before coming back to the train station to head to the Cinque Terre. Any suggestions?

Thank you!

We dropped our rental off at the Florence airport... the easiest place we could think of. It's north of town (if memory serves), but right off the highway. From there, you can either catch a cheap shuttle to the train station or grab a cab. (We didn't want to wait for the next shuttle, so we found two other tourists and split a cab for about the same price.)

Btw, I recommend taking photos of your rental car when you get it. We were nearly charged for some totally hidden ding on our car that we did not make.

Hi L,

Didn't your rental agency tell you where their drop off locations are?

((I))

The drop off at Borgo Ognissanti is not far from the station..

Ira, I haven't rented yet and am trying to decide WHICH drop off would be the best for our plans.

Thank you ek and slangevar - from other posts I am seeing it looks like the Borgo drop off would be our best choice. I am hearing that it is not too difficult to get to that one and it is close to the train station like we were hoping. Thank you!

I asked this same question last summer! But, we weren't getting on the train, just staying a night nearby. One thing to check is that you don't accidentally drive in an area that there is a fee to drive in. That was my fear - that we would get some bill from the rental car agency a few months later for inadvertantly driving in the restricted zone. We ended up dropping at the airport and taking a cab in. As I recall the airport isn't far from town and it was a quick trip. It was worth the cost of the taxi not to have to worry about driving in Florence. We drove out of Florence several years ago and it was fairly nerve racking.

I think your best bet is to drop at the airport and take a taxi or bus to the station--you do not want to drive in Florence,and the airport may be your only choice on Sunday.

Linda: It IS easy to drive to that location from outside Florence. We entered from the autostrada after driving up from part to the south. You do have to navigate one-way streets, but with printed driving directions, or a GPS, it is not difficult.


I will tell you, however, that that was the day we received our one and only traffic ticket in Italy...somewhere around Piazza Tasso we entered, without realizing, a zone that was closed to non-residents.

I had not know about these zones before, or rather I had known but not paid much attention.

So this is just a head's up to be a bit careful and keep checking for signage as you drive into the city, if that is, indeed, what you decide to do.

A STRONG SUGGESTION-After many successful drop-offs at the downtown "Borgo" site, we gave up. The ZTL no drive zones are tricky, difficult to understand and see and very costly when the nasty surprise arrives 6 months later. The problem is you must navigate perfectly without so much as a repeat "go-around" in order to avoid the ZTL. The Borgo site has a one way entrance from a very specific venue and cannot be deviated from to avoid the ticket. I highly recommend dropping your car off at the airport and taking the convenient shuttle bus to the train station--its about 4 euro per person--taxi is about 20 euro.

My family members have always returned their rental cars to the Florence Airport and taken the shuttle bus into Florence. They have several relatives that live outside of Florence and they told them to return the car to the airport to avoid being ticketed for accidently driving into the ZTL zone.

I think the advice re: taking a photo when you pick up the rental car is a great one - and when you drop it off - we had the same experience as slangevar. If my husband hadn't kept insisting the ding wasn't ours, we would have had to pay for it. We drove into Florence and didn't have any problem, but it sounds as if the airport is pretty easy. The only thing to check is that I know that there are often surcharges for picking a car up an airport, I don't know if that applies when you drop it off.

HI lin,

>Ira, I haven't rented yet and am trying to decide WHICH drop off would be the best for our plans.<

Try www.autoeurope.com, www.kemwel.com, www.gemut.com and www.novacarhire.com.
((I))

An alternative to the airport is to drop the car in a nearby7 town & train into Florence. We have twice dropped out car in Arezzo, with a 30-45 minute run into Florence. Arezzo is a very pleasant town, with excellent antique markets. And if you are into Piero della Francesca, there are the Legend of the True cross frescoes, and other paintings in the city.

Trotsky