flyerbjorn

The breakfast is quite basic.

The elevator situation is only bad (read: wait 5 min) in the morning rush hour, as all guess are heading down for breakfast. The rest of the time, it's fine.

Ask for a high floor. In the morning, the elevators are full by the time they get to the lower floors. As an SPG gold/platinum, I've always gotten a room near the top, typically on the north side with a view.

Consultette

Not true re: the elevators taking 5 minutes during rush hour. I've waited a good 10-15 minutes to get one in the morning which actually had room for me. I have also had one day that was so bad my coworker walked up the stairs to one of the upper floors to fetch me and my luggage before an elevator arrived. That has to be at least a 10 minute walk and the only reason he hoofed up there was I had been waiting too long and my suitcase was too heavy to carry myself.

steveman518

Just had a stay in the hotel-they let me have a 7am check-in for my stay, which was awesome such that I could take a shower before BRT (I think they gave it to me as a gold, since they seemed to be refusing other people early check-in). I also didn't try the breakfast spread since I had breakfast appointments, but overall everything was satisfactory. The elevators weren't a problem from the 37th floor, though that may be due to it being the weekend. Neighborhood is ok at night-had no problems walking back from Koreatown after 1am (of course you should be cautious regardless)

EWRFlyerAL

This is one of the worst properties I have ever stayed at last month. Room was dirty and noisy. Elevator situation was horrible. It took 25 minutes one day and after that I walked the 19 floors. Another time a maintenance man got in the elevator with me pushing a huge cart. No excuse me. He said, "step to the side, I've waited long enough for the elevator and crammed into an already crowded space." Manager and staff ranged from disinterested to rude. The only positive was that they let me check out early. I looked at the breakfast one morning and it looked like the line for a soup kitchen. Overall gave me a very negative opinion of the Element brand. Forget Platinum recognition, the staff doesn't offer any type of customer service regardless of status.

rikramer

I have to echo previous warnings about this property. The elevator situation is insane. I've waited anywhere from 5 to 25 minutes to get on the elevator. During the hours of 8am to noon, you will be waiting for a VERY long time. The front desk admitted to me that the ratio of rooms to elevators was a major design error when they were building the property. I'm not really sure what they can do at this point short of adding another elevator bank.

The lobby is also always a complete madhouse. It's like they are conducting an experiment to see what happens if they shove in as many rooms as possible at the expense of everything else (lobby, front desk, elevators, etc.)

This is not the type of property that you stay at if you'd like to relax or if you have to be places by a certain time. The property is not expensive but, like most things in life, you certainly get what you pay for.

DealAddict

This hotel has a lot of bedbug reports on tripadvisor. Last one just recent...

mersk862

Stayed here recently on a mattress run - found a rate of $100 and had a few hours in between trains at Penn Station, so figured this was a good time to knock out Element for my 11 properties/11k SPG points.

Walked up from Penn Station - it's about a 5-10 minute walk up 8th Ave.

Walked into the lobby and it was a madhouse - families everywhere in a small space. No line to check in though and was given a bag for being a SPG guest containing two bottles of water and a granola bar.

Elevator situation was as bad as advertised. Three small elevators that could hold maybe 6-7 people max. Took me four tries to get on an elevator.

Room on the 11th floor was fine. Wifi was iffy - worked fine on my laptop but not my iPad. Mattress was incredibly soft, so that makes me tend to look at the Sheraton instead in the future (I prefer a firm mattress). View of the room was right into the Port Authority garage.

Hotel offered a happy hour that was going on when I checked in with free beer, soda and food. Food included veggies and dip as well as some very sad looking mini pizzas (cheese and pepperoni) - the types that looked like they were thrown in a microwave for a minute and that was it. Based on that, the fact that I was having dinner later in New Jersey and the elevator situation, I decided that it wasn't worth it. Breakfast was mentioned that it was part of the rate, but as I wasn't there in the morning didn't check it out.

silvergirl

Has anyone stayed here lately? I considered this for an upcoming stay, but am reconsidering after reading this thread!

Keyser

just stayed here earlier this week....i wouldn't hesitate to stay here again....anything in particular you want to know????

silvergirl

That's good to know - thank you.
What worried me were the comments above re noise, dirty, bed bugs and extremely slow elevators. Did you experience any of these issues at all?

I was also wondering whether with the kitchen in the room, there is any noise from the fridge at all?

Many thanks!

Keyser

no noise, clean room & no bed bugs....the elevators get very busy during breakfast time but besides that i have never had a problem here....to counter this i have now started asking for rooms on lower floors & just take the stairs during breakfast hours....

the noise from the fridge is barely noticeable....its never bothered me....

silvergirl

Thanks! Very promising - appreciate it ^

CP@YOW

The breakfast offering has really gone downhill. I'd rank it below a Hampton Inn now. No hot items, whereas they used to have egg mcmuffin type sandwiches, pancakes/waffles, etc. The only eggs are hardboiled. At least they still have decent bagels.

shoopy1

pinniped

That hotel never held any appeal with me to begin with.