Independent Hotels Offer Low-Cost Rooms
<B> Independent Hotels Offer Low-Cost Rooms</B>
By Robert Selwitz
<i>New York</i> - While high occupancies and rates continue to make Big Apple hotel bookings a challenge, the New York City room crunch has spurred development of several low-cost, yet business level, lodging options.
The key to finding viable discounted space, however, is being flexible in terms of location. Getting business travelers to forgo dead-center Manhattan locations and national flag brands can contribute to substantial savings without sacrificing hotel service. Indeed, many high quality properties in Manhattan are a short subway or taxi ride away from city offices.
For example, at the Empire Hotel Group's seven properties, room rates average $100 per night, and room amenities match those of Sheraton and Marriott, according to Glenn Issacs, general manager for the hotel group.
The recently renovated Hotel Lucerne on Manhattan's bustling Upper West side, for example, features 250 spacious well-appointed rooms. The hotel, a 10-minute cab ride from midtown, features rooms offering a comfortable desk and work area and two-line modem-ready phones. Other amenities include a fitness center, irons and ironing boards, coffee makers, hair dryers and robes, and marble and granite bathrooms.
Corporate takers for the Lucerne's $120 corporate suite rate include Atlantic Records, Columbia Artists and Price Waterhouse. The single-room rate for corporates is $105, however, "whenever space is available, we regularly upgrade single room corporate clients to suites," Isaacs said.
Further uptown, the Hotel Newton offers 110 clean and comfortable rooms, many of which offer eat-in areas stocked with microwaves, a refrigerator, brand new bathrooms and beds as comfortable as those in better known business hotels.
Corporate single rates are $70 per night while suites cost $85. According to Isaacs, the Newton is "ideal for companies where employees aren't making $100,000 annually and which don't want to spend $200 a night to comfortably accommodate them. That's particularly the case if the employee is here for extended stays such as for training courses."
Surrounded by medium-priced ethnic restaurants, the property is a half block from an entrance to a subway station, with local and express service to downtown, and a 15-minute cab ride to Times Square.
Other Empire properties include the 170-room Hotel Riverside, the 290-room Hotel Belvedere, the 160-room Travel Inn (three blocks from the Javits Convention Center), the 50-room Sleep Inn and 20-room Carnegie Hotel.
"These properties provide maximum comfort and amenities at savings that can approach $100 a night" for an additional bit of travel time and expense, Issacs said. Further, he added, "many of them--such as the Lucerne--are in real neighborhoods, places where business travelers can relax and unwind after a hectic day. That surely beats fighting the human gridlock increasingly common outside Times Square properties."
Issacs noted that the growth of his properties--and those of other quality independents--has been motivated by price and occupancy pressures on midtown properties. "When midtown is full, that's when independents fill up.
Other quality, out-of-midtown lodging options include the 150-room Malibu Hotel. At $79 a night, the Upper West Side property offers a comfortable, clean room and continental breakfast. Local subways from the neighborhood take less than ten minutes to reach Times Square. And for those with business at Columbia University, the Malibu is a 10- to 15-minute walk from the university campus.
Meanwhile, many budget and economy chains--better known for their highway roadside locations--offer low, out-of-center Manhattan room rates.
The Comfort Inn in midtown, for instance, offers single rooms starting at $99 plus tax, while the Best Western Manhattan features a single rate of $109.