jibi

It now seems that the only remnants of the tornado in downtown have all but disappeared. The sale of the Equitable building caused the speckled white windows to be repaired. The Hudson Grille and the new Philips Arena sign on the corner of Marietta and Centennial also dressed that building up quite nice.

This was the view from my condo on the night of the event... quite scary, especially with the SEC men's basketball tournament semi-finals going on that night.



...and some of the aftermath a few days later.











...and to make it somewhat relevant to the thread...

jibi

As an FYI, Fast & Furious 7 is filming in the evenings this week in and around the area. I got some decent shots of film preparation earlier today from my office. If you happen to be staying at the Downtown hotels, I would say there is probably a good chance the actors and crew are staying at the Westin or W... and the Westin will no doubt have some great views of the action if you get a room looking back toward CNN/COP/SkyView.

CNWO4LIFE

Atlanta has really become a big film town as of late.

jibi

They were filming Term Life (Vince Vaughn) a week or two ago and Rectify (Sundance/TV) around the same time. I'm sure there have been more, but those are the most recent signs we've seen while commuting to/from the office. I'm down in Newnan, so the natural appeal here is The Walking Dead. My wife goes out with a group of people to "walker stalk" and meet the cast members after they finish filming. I at least got an autographed copy of Boondock Saints from Normal Reedus out of it.

I booked the WPP for Wednesday, so I'll post some photos while I'm out walking around (assuming I can get anywhere near the filming) and from my room.

CNWO4LIFE

Awesome.^

I have not stayed at this property fo a couple of years, have they gotten any better, ie rooms and customer service?

SAN 1K

I had a perfectly nice stay here last week. I was contacted before my stay (via email) by a customer service concierge who asked if they could assist. I made a few requests (including a room upgrade!) which were addressed. The glass replacement is long finished. I didn’t see any issues with construction, mold, water, noise, etc. The suites are incredible, I was in a “Georgia Suite” on the 66th Floor. Astounding views. I did have to call to get a bathrobe, there were none in the room. To the extent that I needed service (which was minimal), it was fine though not super-fast (it’s a big place!). I really enjoyed the rooftop rotating bar/restaurant. I normally assume any rotating restaurant will be cheesy. But this one had good food and wine. The restaurant is quite expensive for dinner, but reasonable for a nice lunch. They had live jazz on Wednesday night which was excellent. Overall I enjoyed the stay and wouldn’t hesitate to go again. The hotel is very conveniently located to the Marta line making airport transit simple.

KENNECTED

I hate that room, due to its location. Too high up and the last time I was there the wifi was iffy.

Due to the elevator waits, at this property, I prefer to be on a lower floor.

jibi

Hmm. I've been here no fewer than 15 times in the past year and I've never had issues with the hotel Wi-Fi (5 bars right now). However, cellular/wireless service is a different story entirely. I am on Verizon and I typically have 0 to 2 bars on the higher floors (60 to 70+).

As for the long elevator waits, I can definitely attest to that. Sometimes it is great up here and there's no wait. These are the non-busy times, so my morning walk to the office requires a 15-minute lead time to account for the ~5-7 minutes it takes to get to the lobby. Two of the elevators that service the higher floors are out of commission right now, so the frustration is a little worse.

KENNECTED

Last time I was there I was on the 68 floor, prior to that 63. The wifi was iffy and the cell service non existent. I'm glad you brought that up. My friends on the 21 (27 floor) had no problems with either.

When I've stayed on lower floors I've never had problems with either, so perhaps, at the time of my stays, the service was "iffy".

jibi

I just did a speed test and got 10.11 Mbps downstream and 10.22 Mbps upstream. Not bad. Of course, it is 2am, so I doubt the Wi-Fi networks are overly busy (if I could only say the same about the extremely loud icemaker across the hall).

One thing I have noticed is that suite upgrades have become a rare commodity at this property. A year ago, it was nothing to get a Georgia Suite or an Executive Junior Suite, but here lately it has only been a high floor Deluxe King room. I was pre-booked in a Jr. Suite today, but I was put in a Deluxe when I checked in. I never complain, as it is usually just me staying here. It is just rather disappointing. Of course, there are only 24 total suites and less than that for the upgrade pool. I'm not entirely sure how many Jr. Suites there are and they do not have them as a bookable option.

Anyhow, here's a photo I snapped from my room earlier today. You can see the ground-breaking of the "New Atlanta Stadium" (whatever it will eventually be called) next to the Dome.

KENNECTED

Interesting. This was a property that would upgrade you just to do so, for more than a decade. Since renovation, I wonder if they have reduced the number of suites. Based on OLD information I have in my files, they had 44 suites for Platinum upgrade. One would have been a king or double connected to a parlor the other a king room with an alcove [IIRC this is the Executive Suite].

The one thing I love about this property is that on either side of the parlor for the suites is a double or king room. So if you're traveling with a friend, you can ask for a double room and have the parlor which has its own bathroom.

This property is so large I wish they would bring back their Executive Lounge.

alamedaguy

I have reservations for this hotel for two different nights around the holidays. Neither will allow me to apply suite night awards. I've called platinum concierge a couple of times, but they don't seem to have a good sense of what is going on. The offered explanation is that all of the suites are booked, but that seems improbable for the nights in question. Plus, would that prevent me from even requesting the SNA? I can try calling the hotel directly, but that seems like a task best done during the week. Does anyone have any idea of what is going on?

Starwood Lurker III

Hi alamedaguy,

May I ask you to provide your reservations' detail to us via private mail here or by email below, so that we can help look into this for you?

Best Regards,

Christina Zhou
Social Media Specialist
Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide

[email protected]

alamedaguy

Just completed the weirdest stay I have ever had. I had three reservations for one room each, all for the same night. It was for my family of 5 and my in-laws' family of 4. I was never able to apply my SNAs, but saw a couple of days in advance that all three rooms had been upgraded to "premium deluxe" rooms.

I called late at night the night before to request connecting rooms, and was told the rep could note my reservations, but that it really depended on what was available at check-in. He didn't get my reservation or SPG number, so didn't end up doing anything. I asked about suite upgrades, and he gave me a vague answer about the suites being controlled by the sales department. He told that department would be available starting at 8am when I asked. I called again the next morning and got basically the same answer, but at least got this person to actually note my reservations.

We arrived about 1:45, and two of the three rooms were ready. Those rooms did not connect, but the still occupied room
did connect to one of them. I asked again about suites, and got a similar answer that they must be sold out. Around 4, I checked on the third room, and was told the other people still hadn't checked out. I was offered two connecting rooms on another floor, but declined. I checked again at 5:30, and was handed two already prepared keys for the room with an apology. I cannot guess what would have happened if I hadn't come down to the desk again.

When I went into the new room around 7 having gone up to the Sundial, I saw that it also connected to the room on the
other side. I called down and found it was dirty but unoccupied. The agent offered to see if she could move us there,
then called back to tell me it would be cleaned for us and we could move out of the non-connected room. She was able to
reprogram the keys without me having to come down. This all happened as we were putting our kids to sleep.

While at the Sundial, we went to the bar/lounge area to get dessert rather than a full meal in the restaurant. My four year old nephew was sitting next to me and ordered a lemonade. The server responded that they only had frozen lemonade, and he said that was fine with him. I said it was fine, too. It turns out it was $13 and came in a commemorative glass. Now, there was every chance I would have gotten it for him anyway, but it seems like an appropriate time for the server to have mentioned the price. Maybe she takes her kids out for $13 drinks all the time; I don't know.

In the morning, we went down to breakfast. At check in, I had been told we could do continental breakfast as the plat
amenity. There were no coupons or anything, but they would look up our room number in the restaurant. When we got there, we found out there was no continental breakfast or buffet that morning. There was only one server and things were very slow. The server said we could order whatever we wanted. My wife reports a second staff member told her the same thing when I was away from the table. At our table, we ordered pancakes, a bagel with cream cheese, and ham and eggs with an English muffin. Eventually, the pancakes and an omelet (not ordered) came out. I let the bagel go, but asked for my eggs. A full hour and ten minutes after we had arrived, the ham and eggs (scrambled rather than over medium, as ordered) came out, without the English muffin. I inquired after it and was told it would come, but it never did. I was never presented a bill, but carefully made sure the server noted all 3 room numbers. There ended up being an $80 charge for breakfast on one of my folios and a $55 on another, which I only found out after calling. Thankfully, the kind woman in accounting promptly reversed both charges when I explained what had happened.

Sorry for the long post, but it was truly bizarre. The views were great from the 63rd floor. ^

Fred Garvin

Just stayed there for the first time in about 18 months and had a fine experience. Normally I spend about 80-90 nights/year up near Perimeter Mall, but I needed to be downtown to I booked this location. Nice room (no suite upgrade due to large conferences) with a great view from near the top of the hotel. No problem at all with cell service (which has happened before) or wifi. The only thing was I had the do not disturb sign on the door and they knocked twice to see if the room was occupied.