Ciao everyone, Katie here with your weekly Italy travel update. Today I want to talk about

strikes in Italy because there was a nationwide general strike yesterday, Monday, May 18th,

and there is another one already on the calendar for later this month. First, a little bit of

context. Transport strikes are a regular part of life in Italy. Most months see at least two or

three walkouts, which sounds really daunting, but the good news is that unions are legally required

to notify the transport ministry before calling a strike, and they rarely include all modes

of transport. So it's good to know when the strikes are happening and because they're

pre-notified, it usually gives you time to plan around them. Yesterday's rail strike ran for 24

hours affecting national rail operators, Trenitalia, Italy, as well as local buses and

metro in some cities. In this time, air travel was not impacted. Now, here's the important thing to

understand about how strikes work in Italy. Not every strike causes major disruption,

and even highly disruptive ones do not shut the entire network down. Often, inner city rail services

during the peak commuter windows from 6am to 9am and 6pm to 9pm Monday through

Saturday will run during a strike. Some long distance services will continue all days, including

public holidays, and unfortunately though, regional rail services are a bit more problematic

and subject to being cancelled completely. The best thing that

you can do is check directly with the operator. Trenitalia publishes its list of guaranteed trains

on Trenatalia.com around 24 hours before a strike and I tello does the same on their website

under info and assistance. So if you do have a trip coming up

and a strike is announced, that is your first stop. If your trainees cancelled, you are entitled

to travel on an equivalent service or request a full refund. But I get it. If you are on a two-week

trip and have finely tuned logistics, a refund or another equivalent service may not be

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