Decent deal for the budget traveler
By A Yahoo! Contributor, 02/21/09
As a single guy, I went to NYC for the weekend simply to do some sightseeing. I didn't want to pay the steep Manhattan room rates. I preferred to spend money on food, drinks, the sights, etc.; and frankly, I wasn’t planning to spend that much time in my room. The Econo Lodge fit the bill just fine.
The hotel is located in Jersey City, just across the Hudson River through the Lincoln Tunnel. The easiest, most economical way I found to access the hotel was to hop one of the commuter mini-buses at the “Port Authority Bus Terminal”, which is exactly where my “Peter Pan Bus Lines” bus from Washington, DC, dropped me off. The “Port Authority Bus Terminal” is located between 8th & 9th Ave and W 40th & W 42nd Streets, just 1 block(!!) from Time Square. The min-buses leave from GATE 51 in the terminal. They run every 5 minutes. No reservations are necessary. The mini-bus service begins at 5:30A. The last mini-bus leaves for Jersey City at midnight. The cost is $2.50 (cash only), which you hand the driver when you get on the bus. The mini-bus makes its way through the tunnel and down John F Kennedy Blvd (JFK). You get off at North Street, which takes about 25 minutes. From North Street & JFK, and you walk around 7 minutes through a lower middle class neighborhood to get to the hotel. I felt safe walking through the neighborhood even in the very late evening, and a manager of a nearby store concurred.
After the 7 minute walk down North Street, I found the Econo Lodge. The quality of the hotel, in general, seemed a little below the standard Econo Lodge or Choice Hotels franchise property, just a little run down, but it was fine for what I was looking for. I thought the pictures on the Econo Lodge website reflected accurately what you see when you walk into the lobby and the rooms. The Indian desk clerk was competent and friendly enough. My check-in went smoothly. Upon entering the room, everything seemed reasonably clean. The only anomaly I noticed was there was a hole about 4 inches in diameter in one of the bed covers. Not sure what that was all about. I didn’t really care, though. Again, the room was fine. The room also had a microwave and refrigerator, which I was pretty happy to have. I chilled a bottle of wine and some cheese I brought from home. The room seemed quite enough, and I didn't notice any noise in the halls or bordering rooms. In terms of security, in order to get into the hotel, one has to pass by the front desk; and the front desk was manned 24 hours. Seemed secure enough.
In terms of breakfast, they offered very simple fare: coffee, milk, OJ, cereal, bagels, muffins, and croissants. Again, it was exactly what you see in the picture on the Econo Lodge website. My only disappointment was that the breakfast ended at 9AM sharp, which meant I had to set my alarm!
To get back into Manhattan in the morning, I simply made the 7 minute walk back up North Street (pretty steep hill) to JFK Blvd where I hopped back on the mini-bus. $2.50 and 25 minutes later, I was back in Manhattan, at the Port Authority Bus Terminal and only 1 block from Time Square!
One weak point of the mini-buses, though, is that the service from Manhattan ends at midnight. Instead, to get back to the hotel from Manhattan after midnight, I simply hopped on the PATH train,
http://www.panynj.gov/CommutingTravel/path/html/map.html, which runs 24 hours, costs $1.75, and takes 26 minutes to get to the “Journal Square” PATH stop in Jersey City. From “Journal Square”, I then took an $8 taxi ride back to the hotel.
Bottom line was, I was looking for a clean, safe place to lay my head at night; and in the interest of saving some money, I was open to the minor inconvenience of commuting to my hotel. In the end, it made for a much broader overall experience, and I was happy that I did it. If you are not too picky, and you are simply looking for a halfway decent, reasonably priced hotel (relatively speaking), the Econo Lodge should suffice.
