"You Wanted in Time Square & Less,"
Written: Dec 17 '07 (Updated Jun 05 '08)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Location; Price.
Cons: Cleanliness; Amenities.
The Bottom Line: Recommended only to thrifty people familiar with developing countries' budget accommodations, having a well-developed sense of humor, and a sound immune system.
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| danielpar's Full Review: Hotel Carter, New York, NY |
My wife and I went to New York City on short notice last week. Since we are Big Apple novices, I went to the Web to hunt for a hotel relatively convenient to the places we were visiting. After all, how hard could it really be to find a strategically located, reasonably priced room for a single night? I got my answer, but it wasn't the one I wanted: it was impossible. I checked popular travel websites, and everything that came up with vacancies was between $500 and $600 per night. Since my last name isn't Rockefeller or Trump, those prices were out of my range. I also contacted friends who'd been to New York recently for recommendations. I got several suggestions, all at roughly half these prices, but when I called them, I was told "Sorry, no vacancies."
So, back on the Web, and out of nowhere it seems, the Carter Hotel website popped out. The hotel is located at West 43rd, between 7th and 8th Avenues, conveniently located in midtown Manhattan, one block from Times Square. The advertised price was $125/night, plus tax, for a total of $145, for a double room with a king-sized bed. The pictures on the Web showed clean, modern, comfortable-looking rooms, and the price was more than right. So, after discovering they indeed had a vacancy for the night I needed, I made an online reservation. I received immediate confirmation of my reservation by return email: everything was perfect, and appeared to be legitimate. Better still, the email response even stated that my card would not be charged until I showed up at the hotel to check in.
On Friday, December 7, at about 2:30 pm, my wife and I arrived at the Port Authority bus terminal and walked a couple of blocks to West 43rd. The streets were crowded and busy, with the usual array of characters one expects to find in a major metropolitan center, just the way I like it (most of the time). As we turned the corner into W 43rd, we passed the entryway into the prestigious Westin Hotel (expensive, and no vacancies, of course), a nightclub called Cheetah's, an underground parking garage that had a strange-looking parking attendant at the door who wildly waved a red flag to attract clients at $5.99 for each 1/2 hour (I've heard that’s a bargain in New York City), and a deli, the "Lucky Star Café." And then, in beautiful blue neon light letters over a pink neon light background, above a bronze- colored awning, the sign, "Hotel Carter."
Hotel Background
The Carter is a tan brick, 24-story building on a busy stretch of West 43rd Street between Seventh and Eighth Avenues. According to its advertising, it's a few steps away from Times Square in the heart of the theater district, and within walking distance of the United Nations, Rockefeller Center, Fifth Avenue, Macys, the New York City Public Library, Radio City Hall, and every major museum in the city. The Carter boasts 600 renovated rooms, all with private baths, at a price of under $100.00 per night for a single, plus tax. The hotel is popular with foreign travelers, students and tourists on a tight budget. On the website, the Carter claims "a unique, inviting departure from traditional hotels in Manhattan." This is surely the truth, but perhaps not for the reasons they think. "Unique" and "inviting" are words I wouldn't have ever associated with the Carter, but since the owner is of Vietnamese descent, maybe his dictionary doesn't define those words the way mine does.
A little research after returning home gave me more information about the Carter's history. When it opened in 1930, it was called the Hotel Dixie. It had entrances on 42nd Street and 43rd Street, and the Central Union Bus Terminal was located in its basement. The price for a single was $2.50/night, later raised to $2.75/night, in 1937. Subsequently, the Carter Hotels Operating Corporation purchased the hotel, which still kept its "Dixie" name. A 225-seat theater opened there in 1966 with the musical comedy "Autumn's Here." In the early 1980s, and for several years thereafter, the City of New York used the Carter to house homeless families.
Mr. Tran Dinh Truong, now 75, a Vietnamese businessman who lives in the hotel, bought the Carter in 1977, and is the co-owner with his assistant, Elaine Nguyen. Ms. Nguyen often claims they just don't have the money or the staff of the big corporate hotel chains, but she defends the hotel's customer service and its cleanliness, also saying that they do their best to provide safe and clean lodging for budget-travelers. Although the hotel was temporarily closed in 1998 by the city's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene for safety code violations, it was soon re-opened, and according to the report of the latest inspection for rodents in July of this year, the City found no cause for action. However, in 1966, Mr. Truong made the New York Post's "Ten Worst Landlords" list.
The Carter's real notoriety has been brought on by a number of unfortunate "accidents" over the years, including the latest one, in August, 2007, when a hotel maid found the dead body of a young woman stuffed in garbage bags under a bed in a room on the 6th floor. Previously, in 1999, a Carter's desk clerk, fighting with his best friend in the Carter lobby, killed him with a knife and a hammer. And then of course, there was the woman who, with her hands tied behind her back, was pushed out of a window to her untimely death on the street below, and that one other time when the FBI burst in to rescue a four-year-old boy who had been kidnapped from a daycare center in Connecticut, ending up with his abductor in one of the Carter's rooms.
My experience
You know you're not in Kansas anymore from the moment you walk through the glass front door into the foyer. You are in Times Square, as the puzzling hotel motto," You Wanted in Time Square & Less," says. Of course, you have to know which front glass door to use (the three on the right are out of service). It's a kind of psychedelic-pop ambiance, enhanced by neon strip lighting in shades of pink, purple, and turquoise. Walk up a short flight of stairs, the walls decorated with nailed-on (ugly) pieces of mismatched patterned carpet, into the lobby. I was challenged at the lobby door by a man asking me why I wanted to come in. He had an air of authority, so I told him I had a reservation, and he let us pass. I can only assume he was a security guard. The lobby is a visual cornucopia of more purple, pink, and turquoise strips of neon lights running along the walls, near the ceiling, several blaring television sets, some hand-smudged stainless steel panels, and a wall-to-wall multi-colored carpeting (none of it on the walls, however). In the rear of the lobby is a dimly-lit internet café where several questionable characters sat hunched and intent, staring wide-eyed at their monitors. We later figured they might have been arranging "dates" for themselves in anticipation of visiting Cheetah's, which is a well-known strip club.
At the reception desk, the clerk behind the Plexiglas greeted me in my native language, after taking a look at my surname. I took that as a good sign. After all, bullet-proof glass notwithstanding, how bad can a place be, when the clerks are cosmopolitan? Also, even though I had agreed online to a total price of $145, when I offered my credit card, the actual price came out to $136. I think I would have been happier about that, though, if as I waited for the card to clear, I hadn't noticed a sign next to the cashier which read, "We do not rent our rooms by the hour." I wondered if anyone bothered to tell the guys in the internet café about this rule. Also, even though we weren't staying long ourselves, we did encounter people in the elevators and hallways who seemed to be there for even shorter stays.
Undaunted, we took the card access key and rode the elevator to the 4th floor. We emerged into a dark, narrow, nightmarishly carpeted corridor. We followed hand-printed signs through the labyrinthine halls to room 411. As we searched for 411, we passed dozens of battered wood doors painted in either puce or teal green, each sporting a shiny card access lock, and a metal ventilation grate near the top. The halls were intermittently lighted by bare, low-wattage bulbs. There were dark stains on the carpet, visible in the dim light; the walls were flaked and peeling; above our heads were exposed heating and plumbing pipes and large bundles of gold, black, white, and green cables and wires festooned the moldings. Perhaps this was the Carter's take on holiday decorations. On the plus side, though, I did notice several smoke detectors on the ceiling whose lights were blinking, indicating that they were working. After some difficulties in getting the access card to open the door, we were in the room.
An orgy-sized bed occupied practically the whole space. On the floor, another multi-colored carpet, this one in a dark purple and green pattern. I think the Carter must have gotten a good deal on carpets, because this one was somewhat larger than the floor itself, and was nailed partway up, onto the baseboards. The bed was properly made, and the sheets looked fresh and clean, even though they weren't quite big enough to fit the bed. Since I am not part of the City Health Department, I did not feel that it was my job to inspect the mattress or pillows under the sheets and cases (there are just some things I want to accept on faith when I travel). The white walls and ceiling seemed to have been recently painted, as they didn’t have many marks and smudges on them (probably part of the "recent renovation"), but the paint in some places was already peeling, due to serious evidence of water seeping. The walls were absolutely bare, with not even a cheap poster to provide a little color. To the left of the bed, a wood cube painted mud-brown that served as a nightstand. To the right, a single moldy-looking chair upholstered in faded red velour served as the night stand. The only light in the room, which we turned on as we opened the door, was a naked bare bulb suspended from the ceiling. This unshaded light fixture resembled a huge condom, or maybe an ancient giant metal syringe. The only other piece of furniture in the room was a dilapidated, low chest of drawers, 18th- or 19th-century yard sale vintage, on which rested an equally aged television set. For lack of anything better to do until it was time to go out again, I tried to get the television running, but it was in vain. My wife decided to call the front desk for assistance with the television, but the telephone didn't work either. Everything was plugged in, but they were deader than the doornails holding the carpet on the walls. I didn't consider the lack of television a great loss, as I had come to New York for another purpose. And as for the telephone, well, hotels telephone rates are notoriously expensive. Maybe that was the Carter management's plan -- to furnish the rooms so sparingly and with such decrepit stuff, that guests saved both time and money by getting out of there fast.
The bathroom was a perfect match for the bedroom, basic and primitive, painted an indifferent white, with large black tiles on floor and walls (the only light switch was partially covered by the tiling), a mirrored medicine cabinet, and a single shelf for towels, a plastic-lined waste basket, a bus-station toilet, and a deep, rusty, grimy bathtub. Although there were several unopened bars of complimentary soap, two small towels (these looked clean), and the waste basket lining was fresh, there were not even plastic cups, no toilet paper dispenser, and the tile floor around the toilet was stained in much the same way I'd expect around an airport urinal. The bathroom light was a 40-watt naked bulb on the ceiling. It cast the kind of faint, eerie glow that makes faces (even handsome ones like mine) look like something out of "Tales from the Crypt."
Bathroom inspection complete, I headed toward the window at the far end of the room. Pushing the curtain aside, I could see enough through the grime to make out the cement wall of the building next door, an arm's length away. At least our room was not overlooking busy 43rd Street. The steam heating system, hidden behind the chest of drawers, was adequate on that cold day, and the room was warm, if stale.
I sat on the edge of the island-bed, scanning my domain for the day. I noticed little things: wiring of all sorts sticking out of the walls in the corners, plus some plaster chunks, paint chips, and other detritus (I won't hazard any guesses). There was also a closet near the door, kitted out with couple of ancient, bent wire hangers that wouldn't bear the weight of a woman's dress or a man's shirt.
Our my way out of the room, I noticed on the inside of the room door no less than three safety locks which can only be opened from the inside of the room. At least we could be assured of having a safe, if somewhat less than luxurious, night.
In the lobby, we asked the doorman for help in hailing a taxi. He was all smiles, and he did stand arm extended for several minutes out in the middle of the cold, windy street, but in the end, he admitted defeat, came back in and told us we'd have to walk a block or so and try on another street. I am sorry we did not get to meet another Carter employee, Mr. Frank Davis, who has worked at the hotel for 43 years. His boss, Mr. Truong, says that that Frank isn't exactly a treasured employee -- he's more like the bell-hop from Hell. Apparently, Mr. Truong has filed suit in Manhattan Superior Court to get an injunction keeping the alleged bully bell-hop out of their hotel, claiming he regularly -- and loudly -- abuses, intimidates, and threatens guests and keeps management "in constant fear for their lives." But that's a story for another time.
My wife and I finally got where we needed to go, and returned to the hotel some time after midnight. Thanks to multiple glasses of excellent French champagne imbibed earlier, I drifted into sound sleep. My wife, however, lay awake most of the night after hearing loud voices arguing in the hallway outside our door, and then in the subsequent silence, a small squeaking noise. She waited for whatever was squeaking to jump up on her, and didn't want to close her eyes. We were out the next morning, around 8:00.
I would recommend the Hotel Carter for its location and for its price, but then only to people with a well-developed sense of humor, and a sound immune system. Remember that no matter whether you pay $1,000 per night or $100 per night, when you turn off the lights, both rooms will still be dark. However, short of implying that Mr. Truong must have "connections," I am still puzzled, wondering how such an establishment can pass, as it apparently repeatedly does, all the health and safety codes of the City of New York.
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
danielpar
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Reviews written: 39
Trusted by: 26 members
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