The highlights of the Hyatt Regency San Francisco are its Guinness world record-setting lobby, the largest in the world, and its club lounge which is the hotel’s former revolving top floor restaurant.
Less appealing, perhaps, are the new 185 square foot rooms that the hotel has constructed out of hallway space on the east end of each guest room floor.
Just how precious is square footage in San Francisco these days? The Hyatt Regency converted hallway space into 15 rooms … but at least they have great views. @RolandLiSF on the trend of tiny hotel rooms: https://t.co/x20JvaK3cZ
— San Francisco Chronicle (@sfchronicle) December 26, 2019
Forty percent smaller than the average guest room at the hotel, these new tiny spaces at least feature views of the bay. And as if to try to convince guests they’re in a special place, rather than a converted hallway, these rooms feature selfie sticks and binoculars.
Of course there are no dressers – instead drawers are under the bed and “luggage benches..double as seats.” The new room type is ‘1 King Water View’.
This hotel has been playing games with its inventory for years. You don’t need to worry about being assigned one of these 185 square foot rooms on an award stay because good luck booking an award stay here in the first place.
The base room type is 1 King or 2 Double Beds (no view specified). However just because that room type is for sale, doesn’t mean an award is available even though that’s a standard room. The hotel simply doesn’t publish the ‘standard rate’ for the room type when it doesn’t want to let members stay on points. (A room category lower than the new 185 square foot hallway is deemed too good for World of Hyatt members.)
Worth noting this has made all the other rooms less valuable, since guests can no longer wander to the East end of the hallways to grab a view.
And SF itself is simply no longer worth visiting.
Couldn’t have happened to a more dystopian looking hotel 😀
dang, wish i saw this a few hours ago. we’re heading there now on a paid rate. hope we don’t end up in one of these tiny rooms – the woman reserved it and i didn’t see which she picked – but we’re globalist so it should work out.
I have found this hotels management style to be hostile behind the scenes to Hyatt guests
Its never had the good caring kind culture of either the Grand Hyatt or the former Park Hyatt SF
I avoid it like the plague as much as possible even if it means staying in non Hyatt properties
185 SQ ft rooms lol absolutely noooooooooo way best of luck to them
Another reason to avoid the hotel now
@ Gary — Yet another reason to not stay at this hotel. The Grand Hyatt is vastly superior in every way. Plus, as @JackE says, SF is now a horrible place, so not worth visiting as a tourist. I go for for business and to see my friends from 15 years of living here, but the City has become a dump and is a poster child for what is wrong with America outside of DC.
SAN Francisco is a city of enormous charm; unfortunately , in the not too distant future, a visit there is going to be such a PITA ( in respect of cost and potential aggravations such as this) that there must be some point of resistance.
@ Paolo – We are there already there…
San Francisco, like all cities, is what its residents and voters want it to be. And today’s San Francisco was created by its voters.
The ground-floor de-facto-public toilets are convenient for tourists visiting The City downtown.
JetAway is solidly on point as a former resident SF mirrors its residents for the most part. Homeless using Union Square as a restroom. aggressively panhandling with no fear of the police, millions taxed spent on their behalf with no real visible results other than more. Yes we do have a homeless problem in America and yes SF and California as a whole has done little to ease the problem. High Tech has caused affordable housing to completely disappear. And prices to spiral out of control
After World War 2, homelessness seemed to be falling so fast in America that for some years some thought homelessness would disappear in America.
But homelessness has become a growing problem since, and it will continue to be a problem given how dealing with it is not a national priority. And given how the Trump Admin seems to want to cut welfare assistance even way more, the homeless situation won’t be getting better anytime soon.
Maybe they wasted too much space on that atrium?
Haven’t been to SF for a while. Was turned off by a few items, overzealous ushers at the Giants park, adding fees to my restaurant bill, etc. and to be honest too many cities seem to be overrun by tourists. I guess the economy is too good.
Just another reason to skip Hyatt. 185 square ft is 13 x 13 ft a link bed is 6×6. Bathroom size if a mini wini go to a motel 6
Bizarrely I have always had good luck at this hotel. I stay 20 nights a year here for work.
OTOH – I always pay for a balcony room.
I remember staying here when the hotel was brand new roughly 45 years ago, and it was so impressive. In those days the city was lovely as well. These days, not so much, and both have become horribly grim.
@GUWonder- Not sure how Trump factored into your comment, but SF has to be the most distant from Trump that you can get. Not a supporter by any means, but between the former mayor/now Governor and the hometown of Ms Pelosi, everything that SF has become is because of Democratic control-good or bad.
I don’t know why everyone is complaining and worried they will end up in one of these rooms. You book the type of room you want…you don’t just get randomly assigned a different room type than you purchase. This size of room is pretty common in other countries.
For tourists on the go, they only are at the hotel to sleep and that’s it. This is for a traveler who is willing to spend more money than a hostel, but would rather pay for a smaller room with a view than a bigger room with space they don’t need and no view.