It’s how the other half travels.
Travellers are flocking to Sunset Park for cheap hotels, and developers are responding in kind. A fifth hotel opened in a three-block stretch of 39th Street this summer. The semi-industrial area — just steps away from the majestic Gowanus Expressway — may seem an out-of-the-way destination, but you can’t beat rooms with nightly rates more than $100 cheaper than Downtown and Manhattan, one guest said.
“It came down to the price, it was cheaper a night here than it was in the city,” said Hannah Salazar, who came to town for a Manhattan event but stayed at the Days Inn on 39th Street.
Rooms on Sunset Park’s hotel alley range from $130 to $190 per night this time of year — a short train ride away in Downtown, little is available under $275 per night, information from travel websites shows.
The 70-room Wyndham Garden Brooklyn opened between Fourth and Fifth avenues in July — the latest in a number of international chain hotels in Sunset Park. Proximity to a converted shipping facility now home to artists, small-batch brewers, and soon the Brooklyn Nets attracted the business, one hotelier said.
“Having name-brand recognition helps, we are a global company, and Industry City is only a few blocks away, so that has an impact,” said Wyndham manager Omar Bouchaar.
Indeed, Industry City’s owners aim to erect a 400-room hotel of their own for business travellers visiting the rebounding manufacturing mecca, but they need the city’s blessing to do it on the industrial land.
Meanwhile, the new Wyndham hotel’s contemporary design will outclass neighboring accommodations, the hotel’s architect said.
“There are a lot of hotels in the area that are popping up that are similar size, and kind of lackluster in the design area,” said Doug Horst of Horst Design.
But what one area hotel may have lacked in aesthetic, it made up for in customer service. Cops busted the owners of Sunny 39 Hotel — less than a block away — for allegedly running a brothel on Oct. 15.
And the now-shuttered 39 hotel isn’t the only place offering special amenities that attract travellers, another out-of-towner said.
“The dogs!” San Fransciscan Zachary Gluck said of Wyndham Hotel. “It was the only place around here that allowed me to have my dogs.”