In 1946, the Vespa gave Italians their freedom. In 2026, it’s giving Rome its air back

The smell of freshly cooked pizza fills the air as I whizz past trattorias scattered around Trastevere, Rome’s trendiest neighborhood, on my rented shiny red Vespa. It’s just before rush hour, but people are already spilling out onto the cobbled streets, Aperol Spritzes in hand, gathering outside courtyards and Trastevere’s iconic orange buildings as conversations drift through shuttered windows.

Trastevere can easily be dismissed as a tourist trap on the banks of the River Tiber. I was once guilty of making that assumption myself during an extended spell in the Italian capital in 2018. Back then, moving through the district felt like an elaborate game of chess—slipping past musicians serenading tourists, dodging Vespas and bracing myself against the relentless noise of traffic.

This time, while the serenading continues, the noise and traffic is noticeably reduced. And that’s why I’ve come to Rome—to see why air pollution in the capital has decreased, and how the country’s beloved Vespa is playing its part, ahead of the iconic scooter’s 80th anniversary.

Since 2022, Trastevere has been part of Rome’s Fascia Verde (Green Zone), which restricts access for more polluting vehicles across much of the city. Electric vehicles can easily enter, while the oldest petrol and diesel cars, along with older petrol-powered mopeds and motorcycles, are restricted from Monday to Saturday. Rome has had historic Limited Traffic Zones (ZTLs) for decades, but the Green Zone has extended environmental restrictions well beyond the old center.

In 2025, the city renewed the scheme and brought back ‘Ecological Sundays’ for the winter season, which involved a ban on internal combustion engine vehicles during set hours. The car-free days also included urban treks, neighborhood farmers’ markets and information sessions designed to engage residents on environmental issues and encourage them to rediscover the city without traffic.

It also reframes the Vespa fantasy I’ve carried since childhood. Mine began with American teen comedy ‘The Lizzie McGuire Movie’, watching Lizzie climb onto the back of the scooter behind a cute Italian boy and deciding this was what Rome was meant to feel like.

And from July 1st 2026, these rules will tighten further. Even fully electric and hydrogen-powered cars will no longer have automatic free access to Rome’s ZTLs, as the city tries to reduce congestion and ease pressure on limited parking in the city center. Drivers without existing ZTL rights will need an annual permit, costing up to EUR€1,000 (USD1,145), while some eligible groups, including residents, remain exempt or qualify for reduced terms. However, electric Vespas, mopeds and motorcycles remain exempt from the new permit requirement.

The timing feels particularly apt. From 25 to 28 June this year, Vespa’s 80th anniversary celebrations are taking place at Foro Italico in Rome, with the sports complex transforming into a full-on Vespa Village of stages, displays, food stalls and events. But amid the nostalgia, Piaggio’s electric model feels closely tied to the city’s changing streets.

Launched in 2018, the Vespa Elettrica is designed as an evolution of the 1946 original, created after Enrico Piaggio commissioned aeronautical engineer Corradino d’Ascanio to design an affordable and practical vehicle that people could ride every day in post-war Italy.

The result was the Vespa 98, which helped Italians move through daily life again and soon came to stand for something bigger: Freedom, style and the essential pleasure of getting around on their own terms. To this day, Piaggo is the sole manufacturer of Vespa scooters.

The Elettrica keeps the same classic Vespa shape and sense of independence, but replaces the combustion engine with an electric motor and connected technology. Vespa’s lower emission shift is not limited to the Elettrica: Its newer Primavera and Sprint S ranges include electric versions, with removable batteries on the moped models, alongside petrol versions.

It also reframes the Vespa fantasy I’ve carried since childhood. Mine began with American teen comedy The Lizzie McGuire Movie, watching Lizzie climb onto the back of the scooter behind a cute Italian boy and deciding this was what Rome was meant to feel like. Years later, the more tempting fantasy was to ride the Vespa myself. The electric version keeps much of that romance intact—only now it comes with a rental app instead of Paolo.

“It makes sense here,” says my friend Lorelei Greco over a plate of cacio e pepe—a typical Roman pasta with grated pecorino romano and black pepper—and roasted potatoes at Tonnarello in Trastevere. She lives in Rome and switched to an electric Vespa during the pandemic. “Vespa’s electric version keeps its heritage alive, but also gives it a new purpose in how Romans and visitors move through the city,” she tells me.

The shift goes beyond electric Vespas. From January to September 2024, Rome recorded 6.7 million trips on shared electric kick scooters (lightweight, stand-up scooters with handlebars), compared with 1.8 million by bicycle.

It’s visible on the streets as well: Lime electric scooters and bikes slip past me, while buses flash signs reading ‘bus elettrico’ and ‘bus ibrido’ (hybrid bus).

“I wish we’d had electric scooter sharing and electric Vespas back then, like you young ones do now. It would have been better for the noise and I would have made a much more glamorous entrance!”

- Nonna Maria Greco, former market trader

The next morning, I get back on my Vespa to head to lively Ostiense, one of Rome’s former industrial districts, to see the Hunting Pollution mural by Milanese artist, Iena Cruz. Painted across a residential building near a heavily trafficked junction, the work shows a heron surrounded by polluted water and oil barrels. Its title plays on the bird’s hunt and the paint’s purpose: The mural uses Airlite, a paint activated by light and made with titanium dioxide, designed to help break down pollutants from passing vehicles and stop dirt from settling on the surface.

Rome’s Fascia Verde rules tackle the same issue at street level, restricting the most polluting vehicles across much of the city and tightening limits. By reducing the dirtiest traffic around it, the Green Zone may help limit the soot and grime that dull exterior surfaces, giving the mural a better chance of retaining its brightness.

The difference is palpable as I zip over to nearby Mercato Testaccio, a market that seems to gather half of Rome under one roof: A vegan stall at one end, a barber shop at the other, and counters selling focaccia, cheese, olive oil and arancini in between. Lorelei’s nonna used to sell fruit near the old market site before it closed after almost a century of operation, and is back in her old haunt when I meet her.

“It was engines, horns and shouting from morning until evening,” Nonna Maria Greco tells me in Italian over fresh orange juice and espressos, as Lorelei translates.

Rome had actually introduced electric buses as early as 1989, with a fleet of 42 operating on three lines by 1996, but those early services were mostly concentrated around the historic center. Cleaner transport was still far from the norm when Nonna worked near the old market.

“I wish we’d had electric scooter sharing and electric Vespas back then, like you young ones do now,” she tells me. “It would have been better for the noise and I would have made a much more glamorous entrance!”

Rome feels a lot different from the one Nonna Maria describes as I zoom back towards the city center for an early dinner, bypassing a recycling unit, several charging points and a stream of open-top electric cars along the way.

By the time my red Vespa reaches Piazza del Popolo, where Via del Babuino, Via di Ripetta and Via del Corso fan out into Rome’s Tridente—the city’s bustling center extending from the Spanish Steps—the streets are packed with people. Yet for one of Rome’s grandest shopping districts, there is surprisingly little traffic noise.

I can hear glasses clinking, church bells chiming, conversations carrying across the square, and even the rush of air against my face. In 1946, Vespa answered Italy’s need to get moving after the Second World War. 80 years later, it feels as though it is responding to another kind of necessity: How to move through Rome without drowning it in noise and exhaust fumes.

****

Adventure.com strives to be a low-emissions travel publication. We are powered by, but editorially independent of, Intrepid Travel, the world’s largest travel B Corp, who help ensure Adventure.com maintains high standards of sustainability in our work and activities. You can visit our sustainability page or read our Contributor Impact Guidelines for more information.