I recently stayed in the Hotel Pennsylvania on October 25th, 2011. I was attending the Duran Duran concert at Madison Square Garden that night. I went on-line and searched several hotels in the area. The hotel room was about 280.00 plus tax and it came to about 335.00 with tax. I thought that was a little pricey, but compared to others in the area it was the cheapest.I figured it is NYC and close to many tourist attractions. I also picked it because it was close to the concert and for the train to head back up-state. When I first entered the lobby there was a huge line for check-in. I think my friend and I waited about 30 minutes. The lobby area was busy and seemed nice.It probably was the best part. There was a lot of people sitting around waiting. We finally checked-in and were sent to the 12th floor. Once we got the 12th floor it became very dark and dingy looking. The doors were these huge former bank vaults from like 1919. Sure, that was cool, but try opening it over and over. They weighed a ton! We finally got our our room, 1256. It was like a cave! It was dark, old, musty, and just plain ugly. The room needed up updates for sure. The carpet had a lot of mysterious stains. The first thing we did was check the bed for bed bugs. It was ok, but I heard others were not so lucky. The bed was hard. I like a firm bed, but this was like concrete and very low. I did not sleep well. The bathroom was small and I did not want to touch floor. It had some various hairs laying around etc. The toilet and shower were close making for sitting on the toilet a tight fit. The view was into what seemed to be more hotel rooms. I just feel that this hotel that is a bit out-dated and for the money they should really do some up-dates to 2011-2012. We were invited to the club room/lounge and that was where we had breakfast. They had bagels, muffins and coffee in a small room with like a lot of people. This hotel was just ok for a 1 night stay if your just going to a concert or something near by. If I was a foreigner who saved up a lot of money to come to NYC and I was staying here, I would be really really disappointed. If you are staying longer in NYC, I would try something else like the Marriott or Doubletree mid-town. I stayed at those as well for a weekend trip and they were better. We checked out around 11.a.m and wandered around the city till our train. For an extra 4 dollars you can keep your bags in the basement luggage room, which was helpful so we didn't have to carry our bags around the city til our train. I guess I like more up-dated modern hotels, and this was just dark, old and lacked something. The lobby, the website make it look really nice, but once you get there.. it looks very different. So, be careful, research and remember you always get what you pay for, well sometimes.
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