Ancona Station

Ancona railway station, sometimes called Ancona Centrale, is the main railway station of Ancona, Region of Marché (the Marches). It is the most important station of the region and is owned by the Ferrovie dello Stato (FS), Italy's state-owned railway company.

The station was opened on 17 November 1861 upon completion of the railway line from Bologna. The original structure, built in similar style to that of Bologna Centrale, had been heavily damaged during the Second World War and was rebuilt a few years after that.

Ancona's station building comprises two floors; the upper floor is used by Trenitalia as railway offices. The station is located at Piazza Rosselli, in front of the docks. It hosts two small cafes, a newsagent outlet and several retail stores. An Indian restaurant across the road of Ancona station remains open till late; it is a good place to wait for late evening and overnight trains, as shops or food places in the vicinity would be closed.

The station is a principal stop on the Adriatic Railway which runs along the east coast of Italy. There is a junction for a short line to the seaport at Ancona Marittima station.

Mantova

Ancona (, also US: , Italian: [aŋˈkoːna] ; Ancient Greek: Ἀγκών, romanized: Ankṓn) is a city and a seaport in the Marche region in central Italy, with a population of around 101,997 as of 2015. Ancona is the capital of the province of Ancona and of the region. The city is located 280 km (170 mi) northeast of Rome, on the Adriatic Sea, between the slopes of the two extremities of the promontory of Monte Conero, Monte Astagno and Monte Guasco. Ancona is one of the main ports on the Adriatic Sea, especially for passenger traffic, and is the main economic and demographic centre of the region.

Mantua (; Italian: Mantova [ˈmantova] ; Lombard and Latin: Mantua) is a city and comune in Lombardy, Italy, and capital of the province of the same name. In 2016, Mantua became Italian Capital of Culture. In 2017, Mantua was the European Capital of Gastronomy, included in the Eastern Lombardy District (together with the cities of Bergamo, Brescia, and Cremona). In 2007, Mantua's centro storico (old town) and Sabbioneta were declared by UNESCO to be a World Heritage Site. Mantua's historic power and influence under the Gonzaga family has made it one of the main artistic, cultural, and especially musical hubs of Northern Italy and the country as a whole. Mantua is noted for its significant role in the history of opera; the city is also known for its architectural treasures and artifacts, elegant palaces, and the medieval and Renaissance cityscape. It is the place where the composer Monteverdi premiered his opera L'Orfeo and where Romeo was banished in Shakespeare's play Romeo and Juliet. It is the nearest town to the birthplace of the Roman poet Virgil, who was commemorated by a statue at the lakeside park "Piazza Virgiliana". Mantua is surrounded on three sides by artificial lakes, created during the 12th century as the city's defence system. These lakes receive water from the Mincio River, a tributary of the Po River which descends from Lake Garda. The three lakes are called Lago Superiore, Lago di Mezzo, and Lago Inferiore ("Upper", "Middle", and "Lower" Lakes, respectively). A fourth lake, Lake Pajolo, which once served as a defensive water ring around the city, dried up at the end of the 18th century. The area and its environs are important not only in naturalistic terms, but also anthropologically and historically; research has highlighted a number of human settlements scattered between Barche di Solferino and Bande di Cavriana, Castellaro and Isolone del Mincio. These dated, without interruption, from Neolithic times (5th–4th millennium BC) to the Bronze Age (2nd–1st millennium BC) and the Gallic phases (2nd–1st centuries BC), and ended with Roman residential settlements, which could be traced to the 3rd century AD. In 2017, Legambiente ranked Mantua as the best Italian city for the quality of the life and environment.