How long until this one is torn down?
In American cities if you abandon your car on the side of the road, you’ll face an avalanche of fines and possibly the threat of jail time. However, in Italy the government is much more chill as clearly illustrated by the response to Angelo Fregolent’s 1962 Lancia Fulvia being parked on the side of a public road in Conegliano for 47 years straight. That’s right, the car didn’t move and it didn’t have a huge stack of citations left under the wiper blade.
Check out another abandoned car mystery out of the UK here.
In fact, this abandoned car has become so famous it’s a tourist attraction. Now, there are plans to transform it into some sort of memorial. Town officials towed the car on October 20 and moved it to the Auto e Moto d’Epoca Motorshow in Padua for display with other classic vehicles.
The plan is to restore it because the little Lancia hasn’t weathered the elements so well. Once the restoration work is complete, officials plan to park the car outside a local school right next to Fregolent’s house.
According to an interview ran in Italian publication Il Gazzettino, Fregolent said he ran a newsstand where he parked the car. For 40 years he would unload his wares from the trunk right in front of the shop. For whatever reason, when the guy retired he and his wife decided to just leave the old Lancia parked there. There was a mystery surrounding who owned the car for the longest time and the legend spread, drawing in tourists who wanted to see the abandoned vehicle. As they snapped selfies with it and posted them on social media, more people flocked to Conegliano.
It’s nice to see a whole community appreciating the value in a classic car, especially one that’s a little worse for wear.
Sources: Il Gazzettino, Mirror
