UFgatorgal

I just got back from a multiple night stay. The hotel itself was fine, what concerned me was the parking situation which is why I am writing. I wanted to give a heads up to other female travelers thinking of staying here, as both my colleague and I who parked there felt very uncomfortable. I thought it was just me until the next morning she asked if I was nervous as she was about parking at night. Please note I am not someone afraid of traveling alone, I have lived downtown in many big cities including Manhattan and don't scare easily.

The hotel offers 2 options for parking - public garage (part of Guthrie theatre) or underground with in/out priviledges. Since I was there multiple days I chose the in/out option. I would not choose that option again.

Aloft parking is really just the underground parking garage of a condo building behind the hotel that is still under construction and totally unoccupied! You are given a fob to open the garage door then drive down a ramp, turn a corner and pull into one of the many open spots. While that may make for easy parking it also meant EMPTY underground parking garage in a EMPTY condo building….or as my colleague stated "no one to hear you scream" if someone followed you into the garage. Because the ramp is steep it would be very hard to see if someone did follow you in.

My first night (before even talking to my colleague) I returned late from a customer dinner and parked my car. As soon as I got out of the car I felt very uncomfortable. I did not realize when I left during the day that the building was unoccupied. When I returned around 11:30pm, the garage was creepy! It was empty and full of construction materials with only 3 parked cars. I ran back up the ramp and to exit had to go through a side door and across an alley to just enter the hotel. The next night I parked ‘illegally” with all the other cars in a pseudo parking lot outside the front door. I refused to park underground again. My colleague called her 2nd night before pulling into the garage to ask a staff member come out to walk her from the garage, the front desk refused!

Upon check out I shared my concerns about their parking. Apparently I was overheard by "a manager" who said he was surprised to hear my concerns as no one else had commented on it. But admitted he did not realize that it would be scary for someone unfamiliar with the area to be alone at night in an empty underground parking garage of an unoccupied downtown building.

He then told me that I did not have to walk back up the ramp to exit the garage but that there was an "underground tunnel" directly to the hotel. Well that was news to me! I told him that no one told me, there were no signs and it was not like I was going to walk around to explore the garage. I suggested that they re-visit the parking situation and they should do a better job of explaining how to exit. I told him about my colleague requesting an escort but was refused and he said that never should have happened.

I do hope the hotel takes our concerns seriously as I enjoyed the hotel and would like to stay there again.