The walk is about 3/4 mile, straight down either 7th or 8th St. The only part that involves a significant hill is the last block on the trip back. If that's an issue, supposedly you can access the parking garage via the Symphony entrance on "B" Street, then cross over to the hotel access elevator, skipping the hill in the process. Ask the parking guys or the concierge. We walked both ways to/from Petco with 8-9 year old kids in tow, it's really not a bad walk.
We just did a two-night stay over the weekend. We were "upgraded" to a club floor (the top/27th floor) corner room, though the club (as mentioned) is actually attached to the restaurant on 12. The room itself wasn't actually any bigger or better. The room itself was clean and in good shape.
We were gone all day on Saturday and were surprised that there had been no housekeeping at all.
The front desk sent some towels up upon request. No explanation of what happened.
They made a big deal at check-in about Platinum/Club Level upgrades to free buffet breakfast Sat/Sun and a free beer/wine at the bar daily, but our room rate already included breakfast.
The self-parking situation is as big an adventure as advertised, and whomever designed that 7-story corkscrew ramp should be sentenced to drive it 20x/day for life. They do have valet available on the A street side. I would probably do that next time.
The indoor pool on the 12th floor was a pleasant surprise--large, warm and clean. The hot tub is on the small side. There's skylights and picture windows, so it's not at all cave-like like some indoor high-rise pools. While in there we noticed them wiping/sanitizing the gym equipment daily--a big ^^ there.
Bottom line, a decent property; with friendly, helpful staff. We like King + sofa bed rooms (instead of dealing with rollaways), which didn't seem to available at the other downtown SD properties. If you can get a good rate, it's worth checking out. If you're not traveling with kids or want to be closer to the downtown SD nightlife, you might want to look elsewhere.