waste of money
I wouldn't have given it ANY stars, but i had to choose at least one to post this.
We stayed here for the saturday night and sunday night of the chicago marathon weekend. WORST MONEY SPENT EVER! The location was the only positive point. We wanted to be right across from the start/finish of the race and we were. BUT, the room view was awful - looked directly into a room in the building across the street...no privacy, even though we were 12 stories up! We were charged $299 and $359 for the saturday and sunday nights. The heating/cooling system had only one option - on or off. The hotel chose whether hot or cold air came out of the system (based on the season). SO, after my husband ran 26.2 miles, we had no way to cool down the room for him because they had heat on....the only option we had was to turn the knob to OFF. The windows are a serious hazard! Our toddlers were able to pull the handle and open the window, which was only one pane thick and was floor to ceiling....a nice feature if the windows weren't 50 years old! The handle didn't lock. I don't see how they pass any inspections. Also, the elevators...only 2 for all the floors of the building...ran ridiculously slow. We never encountered anyone else on the elevators but we had to wait literally 5-7 minutes every time we wanted to leave our floor! They didn't have the sunday paper available. The coffee in the room was gross. The bath towels had yellow/brown stains on them. There was no portfolio for the hotel that had a map or information on the restaurant in the hotel. We had to call down to the front desk and have them bring up a menu for the restaurant....and they didn't even bring up a menu, they photocopied the pages of it and brought up the loose copy pages. No free breakfast for the price of the room. A less than cold refrigerator in the room. The pool closed from 6-6:30 every night for housekeeping to clean....not sure what they cleaned, because NO ONE was in there every time we went by. THe water was cold and had spiders in it. The sauna had someone's shorts sitting in there....both days! So, I think the cleaning that they are allegedly doing is a lie! The only other positive point (aside from location) was the bellman that assisted us to and from our room....he was very nice and helpful. But, oddly, he seemed to be the ONLY bellman working every time we were in the lobby. Weird. The parking charge is ridiculous. $37/night. BUT the valet parking is the ONLY option...there are no other places to park nearby.
We, curiously, walked next door to the Hilton to see what their rates were....$269/night starting!!! That was a better rate than either night at the Essex. So, we are booking our room now for next year's marathon...AT THE HILTON!