Every since I arrived in Florence, I have been extremely surprised by the amount of focus the people of Florence have on sustainability. On every street, there are multiple different trash cans all labeled for different things such as plastic, glass, compostables, packaging, and more. The residents here take time to separate all of these different items into multiple trash cans in order to be more sustainable with their trash.

Another thing they focus on sustainability wise is using less electricity. Many of the apartments across Florence do not have air conditioning. If they do, the residents use is sparingly and only run it when they are in their homes. If the weather is not that hot, like in the spring and fall months, they rely only on fans to cool their homes.

For being a city, Florence has many more green areas than I would have thought. There are numerous parks and gardens where locals and tourists can go to hang out and relax. There may not be a lot of them in the city center, but in the surrounding neighborhoods there is tons of greenery.

Finally, you do not see as many cars in Florence. Taxis are used a lot to get around for the tourists, but you rarely see any locals in them. Locals use things like bikes, motorcycles, trains, or buses to get where they need to go. The city itself has a very walkable layout, so for the locals who still live in the city center and for tourists this is also a great option.

Pittsburgh also has options for this kind of shared transportation, but the city itself is less walkable so many people still have their own cars to get around. The greenery also reminds me of Pittsburgh, because for being a city Pittsburgh still has many green spaces in it. One big difference between Florence and any place I have been in the US is the trash and recycling. I think this is a very unique idea to have all different bins for easier separation that I’ve never seen before. I think sometimes in the US it is hard and they are still pushing just for people to separate trash and recycling, so this could be an eventual step but citizens would have to work towards this.

I think every city has its pros and cons. This is what Florence is excelling in but they currently face a major housing crisis that is causing many of its residents to move into the outskirt neighborhoods to save money. This increases the amount of apartments available on websites like Airbnb, only worsening their tourism problem. Every city has its ups and downs but sustainability wise Florence is doing very well.