Pisa International Airport ground transport

Pisa's airport sits two kilometres from the city, which is unusual enough, but the number that matters here is five: the PisaMover automated shuttle covers the distance to Pisa Centrale station in five minutes, every five to ten minutes, from around six in the morning to midnight, for six euros. There is no queue for a driver, no traffic, and no timetable to memorise. Once you are at Centrale, Tuscany opens up — Florence in about an hour by train, Lucca in half an hour, the coast at Viareggio and Livorno in twenty to forty minutes. That is the whole logic of arriving here. Most PSA passengers are not going to Pisa at all. Florence's own airport is small and its runway restricted, so a great many Florence-bound travellers land at Pisa and continue, which is why Autostradale runs a direct Sky Bus at fifteen to twenty euros taking about an hour and ten minutes, and why the taxi fare to Florence sits around a hundred and seventy euros — a real price for a real journey, not an opportunistic one. For Lucca, the Sky Bus at five to eight euros in thirty minutes is the easiest connection on this list. Pisa itself deserves more than the ninety minutes most people give it: the Leaning Tower and the cathedral stand in the Campo dei Miracoli, but the university city around them, the river frontage and the Keith Haring mural near the station are the parts visitors miss. In town, a taxi from the airport runs eighteen to twenty-five euros on the meter — though for two kilometres, walking is genuinely an option in good weather, and the PisaMover is quicker than either.