LA NASCITA E L'AFFERMAZIONE DELLE AUTOLINEE EXTRAURBANE IN ITALIA (1895-1929)

The aim of the essay is to analyze the rise of the Italian interurban and rural bus network from its beginning - at the end of the XIX Century - until 1929. What I argue is that, despite the few historiographical studies dedicated to this topic, the bus network played a significant role in the social and economic development of the rural areas of Italy. Before the spread of private motorization, the Italian population was involved in a process of public mass motorization, which influenced the labor market, the social mobility of people, the economic, commercial and social networks and that was more or less efficiently used by the governments as a nation-building tool, not unlikely the railway or telegraph networks.