David J. Danto

Business travel thoughts in my own, personal opinion

eMail: ddanto@IMCCA.org Follow Industry News: @NJDavidD

Day Tripper

It doesn’t happen very often, and certainly has been scarce during the pandemic, but this past week I needed to be up before sunrise for a dawn meeting in Manhattan, essentially hang around the city all day, and then attend an evening event. That’s no sweat when you’re younger and aren’t fighting to stay away from COVID, but nowadays – for me anyway – I decided I needed a place to work, rest, shower, change, and basically recharge. I needed a day-room. It’s a thing I’d have always indulged-in when landing in a faraway land too early to check-in, but have rarely needed this close to home. Luckily I was able to find a roughly $100 rate at the Hampton Inn Times Square Central – which was about eight blocks from my evening event.

This property is in the middle of 41^st Street in Manhattan’s Times Square. One could walk out the door and walk a couple of dozen steps to see Aladdin or The Lehman Trilogy on Broadway. Arriving there at about noon I found myself waiting behind the proverbial ‘Karen’ arguing that “as a Hilton Honors Diamond that has stayed around the world” she was “incensed that they would not let” her check in earlier than the required 3pm check-in time. The clerk wanted to charge her an additional $60 for the early check in. A manager appeared and caved-in to her privileged demands. I was finally able to check-in after waiting for that spectacle to end. Getting on the elevator to my room I noted it was odd to experience a Hampton branded property with floors into the 30s. Usually five or six is the top floor at a Hampton Inn.

The room I received was very modern but very small. It is I suppose on par with midtown rooms I’ve stayed in in San Francisco or London (or the few times I’ve had to overnight in midtown Manhattan) – barely space for everything in it.

The photo above left show 90% of the room, with the bed to the left and the wall mounted desk (with my PC on it) to the right. The photo above right is a scrunched panorama of the tiny bathroom – sink, toilet, stall shower. The room is nicely appointed but as I said, very small.

For the day stay I could have checked in much earlier (9am I think) but my morning meeting ran long, so I missed-out on about half the stay. If it had been a six-hour rest-stop as I anticipated I’d have probably napped and showered. As it turned out I walked into the room just as a business meeting / video call was starting, and never had the time to rest or shower. I would like to be able to tell you if the bed was comfortable, but regrettably it was only used to hold my rollaboard as you see above.

I left the property at about 3:30pm and walked to my evening event. Of course I had to walk through the heart of Times Square – an entertaining experience for tourists and a typically huge annoyance for most New Yorkers – but it was still likely the closest place I could have stayed at that price. I’d definitely do it again if the circumstances come-up again.

My evening event was a repeat of the AV / Collaboration industry cocktail party I hosted in June. It was for COVID vaccinated people only (which is enforced by restaurant staff in accordance with the law for all New York restaurants) on a covered, outdoor deck.

As the organizer, I also asked people who were feeling under the weather to cancel their planned attendance, and asked that people who had traveled to an unwise industry conference in Florida the previous week get COVID tested. Everyone complied, about a half dozen canceled because of how they were feeling or their test results, and everyone had a great time reconnecting.

I am looking forward to more jurisdictions around the country helping event organizers like me enforce these basic safety guidelines until COVID has finally passed. It is not enough to mandate masks in the ‘convention center’ if there are no vaccinated-only, outdoor capable bars and restaurants to safely support any evening activities.

This article was written by David Danto and contains solely his own, personal opinions.

All image and links provided above as reference under prevailing fair use statutes.

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