Weary Road Warrior

The AmericInn hotel hotel chain is touting their AmericInn SoundGuard™ construction is the first of it’s kind in the hospitality industry. AmericInn proclaims in their press release, that their “room environments have been scientifically proven to be significantly quieter than others in the industry.”

While I can’t speak to ever having stayed at an AmericInn property, I would say that I applaud them for effort to construct their hotels to be as soundproof as possible. I echo the sentiments expressed in a 2007 National Business Traveler Monitor study AmericInn cities in their press release that states “a quiet room is becoming of high importance to travelers”. But my question is, one has it every not been important to business travelers, let along leisure travelers to not have a quiet room.

I know in every room that I stay in I always request to be as on high as a floor as possible, and that my room be as far away from the elevators, or any other high traffic public areas of the hotel. Soundproof construction or not, I know there is not much that can be done to deafen the noise generated by group of rowdy conventioneers, coming home from the bars as they spill out of the elevator and to trying to remember their room numbers. The best sound proofing technology in my opinion is avoidance of sound.

Share This

Tags: annoyances, hotels, sound

The Roanoke Times reported on Friday (31-Oct), that on Friday 26th every single seat on every single departure from the Roanoke Regional Airport was full. To extrapolate this occurrence from a small regional airport that can only serve 1500 passengers at it’s capacity, you can only imagine the travel funs that awaits in the upcoming season at the countries larger air hubs.

Share This

Tags: airports, airtravel, holidays, news

Each week I fly between what I unaffectionately call the “Bermuda Triangle” of airports - O’Hare and Newark. While two airports don’t create a triangle, the effects of traveling between these two airports is just as odd things seen in the Bermuda Triangle: planes for some reason can’t break the gravitational pull of earth when they are scheduled to do so! The effect “strange effect” most often seen is a delay of at a minimum of 45 minutes, but typically delays are 90 minutes or more.

The airports in the New York Tristate area earned the dubious honor of being the worst airports for on-time departures in the country according to a recent FAA report. This is not new news, in November 2005, Senator Charles Schumer completed his own report which came to the same conclusions. While the actual language of the Schumer report is more civil in it’s condemnation of the FAA and the Tristate airports, I think the Gothamist most succinctly summarized the report: NYC Area Airports Suck, Says Schumer. ‘Nuff said.

I think the FAA and Schumer’s reports have only looked at one half of the problem. The study I would like to see is what are the best, or worst combinations of airports (or routes) for air travel. For example, am I better served traveling between O’Hare and Philly and then driving North a hour and half then traveling directly Newark? If this study was done, I can only guess that the Newark and Chicago combo would have to be rated the worst.

Is there a report that tracks problematic routes? To be continued…

Share This

There is nothing a Weary Road Warrior likes more than points, and Marriott has a heck of an offer running. As a part of Marriott’s MegaBonus promotion, Marriott will reward you with at least 10k points by staying 20 nights between 3/1 - 5/31.

Consult Marriott’s site for all the details.

Share This

Upon finishing my morning run today at the hotel, I was very fortunate to receive some praise from Lance Armstrong. Lance was impressed that I had just posted my best time for the mile, and he gave me a nice audible pat on the back.

Lance and other Nike sponsored pro athletes provide motivational audio ques via the Nike + iPod Sport Kit Nano accessory. It’s a great tool for running that tracks for each run your speed and distance, and then allows you to upload them to the Nike + website. Even better it’s pretty cheap, currently listed at $29 through Amazon.

The Nike + iPod Sport system allows you to designate a playlist to use for your workout, or select whatever you currently listening to on your iPod. iTunes even sells specific workout specific playlists that include coaching. Perfect for the early mornings in the drab hotel gym when praise from a seven time Tour de France winner can really help start your day off right.

Share This