Italian railways Frecciarossa ETR 500 high speed trains

A Frecciarossa (red arrow) high speed trainset is seen on a recently completed 19 km section of line which completed the High-Speed ​​/ High Capacity line Rome - Naples allowing journey times of only 1 hour 10 minutes.

A total of 30 complete ETR 500 trainsets have so far been built; they have a power output of 8,800 kW (11,800 hp) and the latest speed record is 362 km/h (225 mph) between Florence and Bologna on 9 February 2009. Those ETR 500 sets designated as Frecciarossa trains have received a new livery with a red stripe and the brand name on the power cars.

With the new high-speed lines in construction, FS (State Railways) chose to electrify the lines at 25 kV 50 Hz AC instead of 3 kV DC as used on the existing network. This allows the trains to run at the designated top speed of 300 km/h (186 mph), as 3 kV is technically limited to 250 km/h (155 mph) operation.  Early versions of the ETR were only for 3 kV. As the new trains can run both off 25 kV AC and 3 kV DC, they were designated P for politensione (multi-tension).