Turin owns a huge heritage represented by cultural institutions that operate in the most diverse fields of knowledge and are united by a great dynamism. Home of a renowned university, especially famous for its studies in history, economics and sciences, and its world class School of Engeenering at the Polytechnic, Turin also houses a number of cultural institutions of international repute thanks to their splendid libraries, collections of rare and ancient books and priceless documents, as well as the organisation of numerous prestigious activities.
Turin today is a dynamic reality engaged in a modernisation process unrivalled in Italy. From the city of motor car to a centre of advanced technology and integrated productive systems, following an original redevelopment project. Although it is internationally renowned as an industrial city and a capital of the motor car this, for Turin, is now a stereotype, an incomplete picture. Today, its image is different, more diverse: the city is oriented towards the new high-tech Europe, that of advanced research.
Turin has not only been the capital of the Savoy Kingdom; it is also the capital of the motor car industry, of the Alpine peaks and of the cinema: precious collections, testimony to these facts, are housed in some of the most important museums in the city. In the rooms of the National Motor Car Museum (Museo "Carlo Biscaretti di Ruffia") it is possible to follow the evolution of the motor car, from the earliest steam-powered vehicles to the modern mass production models, from successful racing cars to the latest products of ecological research. In particular, four projects are worthy examples: the former Lingotto car factory has been converted to a complex with modern services, cultural venues and a hotel; the old steel and iron industrial area is being transformed into Europe's first environmental technological park (Environment Park) occupying an area of 100 hectars: the Turin Polytechnic is being doubled in size to cover 13 hectares, and has benefited from a major injection of funds into its research and training activities; finally, the cityìs railway system is being redeveloped and improved with important "passante" (railway link) works (three lines of 15 km placed underground), thus making a radical transformation in the system for the access into the city, and the mobility around it.
Majestic and imposing, the River Po crosses Turin offering to whoever wants to discover the city by taking a ride along th water, a route rich with surprises. The industrial vocation and the image of a city that is dedicated to work and technological innovation, has given a wrong impression of Turin: pushed into the background is the important fact of its peculiar geographical position framed by the Alpine peaks and the hills, its great wealth of parks and gardens, not to mention the unique attribute of the four separate rivers that cross the city - the Po, The Dora, the Stura and the Sangone - an environmental heritage that few cities in the world can boast.
