Carter wears smudged crown as USA's 'dirtiest hotel'
NEW YORK -- "You're not going to be impressed," warns desk clerk Steve Nuñez, handing over the key to Room 807 and a $128 receipt for a night's stay at New York's Hotel Carter. "Most people don't spend much time in their rooms."
With good reason: For the third time in four years, TripAdvisor.com crowned the former Times Square tenement the USA's dirtiest hotel, based on reviewers' cleanliness rankings.
Roaches, rats, black mold and stains of dubious origin figure prominently in the nearly 800 critiques of the 700-room hotel on West 43rd Street. Its website boasts that rooms were "designed with the budget traveler in mind."
"The bathroom made me want to vomit," one TripAdvisor commenter notes. "DON'T LOOK UNDER THE BED!" another cautions. (Apparently, used tissues aren't the only risk. In 2007, a hotel housekeeper discovered a woman's body stuffed into a trash bag under the mattress; she had been murdered by the previous night's paying guest.)
Preparing for a stay in such circumstances requires planning. Silk sleeping bag liner to help thwart bed bugs? Check. Bottled water and towel brought from home? Check. Pajamas? Uh, no. At the Hotel Carter, where reports of vermin and questionable characters are legion, it's probably best to sleep in your clothes in case a quick exit is required.
The lobby scene on a Wednesday night doesn't inspire much confidence: Other than a bored bellhop snacking on Cheez-Its, the only sign of life is a thumping soundtrack wafting from the strip club next door. Across from a vase of fresh red gladiolus and carnations, two large trash barrels stand below missing ceiling tiles and dangling wires.
Yet by Third World budget travel standards, Hotel Carter's Room 807 wouldn't raise many eyebrows. True, the phone doesn't work, there's no bedside lamp, and two of the three door locks are broken. The only way to regulate the sauna-like heat is via a grime-streaked window that opens onto a fire escape, and polyester curtains hide corner dust bunnies the size of tumbleweeds.
