It runs parallel to the historical north–south railway between Milan and Bologna, which itself follows the ancient Roman Road, the Via Aemilia.

The line is part of Corridor 1 of the European Union's Trans-European high-speed rail network, which connects Berlin to Palermo.

The rest of the route was opened to commercial traffic on 13 December 2008 to coincide with the main European timetable change.

The proposal to build a high speed line from Milan to Bologna was announced by the Italian rail operator Ferrovie dello Stato (FS) in January 1988.

On 15 October 1991 FS established a new company, Treno Alta Velocità SpA (TAV), to plan, build and manage the new Italian high-speed lines.

On 15 March 2000, TAV, Italferr (FS's engineering division) and the ENI/CEPAV UNO consortium signed a contract to build the line.

In November 2007 the laying of tracks and the provision of technological systems and electrical equipment was completed for the rest of the new line.

[10] The opening of the line took place on 13 December 2008 with an inaugural trip made by an ETR 500 Frecciarossa, classified as ES* 29405, with a load of journalists and politicians.

At Somaglia the railway enters a 1,019-meter-long (3,343 ft) cut-and-cover tunnel above which a park is being built to mitigate the environmental impact of the autostrada, which the line will move away from near Santo Stefano Lodigiano.

After Piacenza west junction, the railway runs on a viaduct across the traditional line and the Po River near the village of Olevano di Lomellina.

The line crosses the Taro River east of the exit to the Fontanellato tunnel on a long viaduct, which continues for much of the route north of Parma.

Further south the line moves away from A1 to the east in order to bypass the town of Modena to its north on a curve with a radius requires AV trains to observe lower than normal speed limits.

From the Santa Viola crossovers, it is possible, therefore, to reach the surface level of Bologna Centrale station, as well as to route trains to the Porrettana and Verona–Bologna lines.

Shortly after the entrance to the tunnel of the Bologna Passante, which allows the line to pass under the city of Bologna, is Venezia (Venice) junction, a double-track grade-separated interconnection that opened for operation in December 2017, allowing trains coming from the Padua line to enter the underground station.

The trains finally arrive at the underground level of Bologna Centrale, making a stop and then continue towards Florence along the high-speed line.

Most of these stop at Bologna and Florence and since the acceleration of services with the opening of the Bologna–Florence high-speed line on 13 December 2009 take 3 hours 30 minutes.

An additional Eurostar also operates each day each way, stopping at Piacenza, Fidenza, Parma, Reggio Emilia and Modena and taking 4 hours and 58 minutes.