Just because a hotel room is cheap, your room shouldn't smell and you shouldn't be able to hear the phone in the next room ring. My bathroom was so disgusting that I ended up showering at my gym. Most annoying though was when I was waiting for a cab to go to the airport, the doorman tried to talk me in to taking a car service for $30. I declined saying that the taxi was only about $20. He told me that I was wrong and tried to pressure me into using the car service, not realizing that until recently I had lived just a few blocks away -- taxi to LGA ended up being $18 before tip. Things may get better when the hotel renovates but prices will probably go up and the sleezy doorman is likely to still be there.

That all depends on how cheap it is. Don;t know what you paid - but below a certain price - you pays your money and you takes your chance,

Glad you posted this. My parents stayed there when I was married almost 5 years ago. They said it was fine, but small. If nothing else, it was clean. Perhaps it has gone downhill since then, but they also don't have the highest standards!

Sometimes even in older, pricier hotels the walls are thin enough to hear a phone ringing in the next room. No hotel room should smell bad, but we all have a different sense of smell, and perhaps Callebaut's is particularly sensitive to whatever was in that room? Or maybe housekeeping had just done a bad job that day (not OK, but not a reason to completely condemn the hotel forever either).

As to the "sleezy" doorman - did you ever voice a complaint to the hotel about him? How can they possibly know what he is telling people if you don't complain? And you can only hold the hotel responsible for problems of which they are told.

The Doorman might be a sleeze but he got the car service price right- most charge $28 to $30 exclusive of a tip. Since the taxi fare went up from the east side of Manhattan to LGA is in excess of $25 with tip and toll included. You obviously tok a taxi - what was the cost? Was there a toll included?

With tip, tax, and tolls, I always budget $30 For transportation from Midtown to LGA.

Well, I for one am going to heed this advice. I shall never stay at The Pickwick Arms Hotel. And I mean it!