Amtrak Guest Rewards - Amtrak hotel rates?

I am hooked and am including rail in my travel arsenal both as a means to a destination and a destination on its own. I am looking at a MSP-CIN trip to avoid Fortress CVG airfares, the one hangup is the 3AM arrival.

Has anyone has success with booking a hotel for a half a night as it were? I can't reasonably call it extra early checkin nor does my wallet want to part with a full night's rate.

You can have the hotel notate that you request a late (after-midnight) check-in so they don't give your room away (wouldn't hurt to call them just after midnight, too, since they don't always read the notes), but normal check-out times would prevail (unless you have elite status and can ask for a late check-out), so you might not get much sleep.

I've never seen a break in the rate for a "half night" like this. I have seen some hotels on very rare occasions charge a reduced rate for a half day daytime stay (10am-4pm or something like that, basically, when the rooms are empty between check-out and check-in) but not an overnight (makes sense, since they'll need to hold a room for you for the whole night).

I'd recommend booking a cheap hotel within reasonable cab distance from CIN Union Station (which is a mile west of downtown--it's not walkable and an industrial, not- particularly-safe neighborhood at night, so you'll want to arrange for a cab). Make it cheap enough that you don't feel bad staying for only half a night. I Pricelined a 3.5* downtown (the Milllennium) for $60, so if you're OK with 2-3 stars for this kind of a quick stay, I'm sure you can do much better. You'd need to check distance from CIN (so the cab cost doesn't become excessive), but other areas of the greater Cincinnati area may work fine and have even better hotel rates.