BY Sarah Phelan
10,000? 30,000? 100,000?
If you guessed 32, 952 rooms, you’re correct–and must be digesting the same economic reports that I’ve been calling bedtime reading this week.
According to a report fresh out of the Controller’s office, the lowest point, in terms of filling all those rooms, was the winter of 2001-2002, when 50 percent were vacant. (Remember, that was the grim post 9/11 moment, when people were afraid to fly to the USA, in case they ended up being flown into a hotel high-rise, instead of staying in one.)
The highest point? June 2000, the height of the dot-com boom, when occupancy peaked at 91.7 percent.
“These numbers suggest that it is practically impossible for a visitor to be able to find a room in the City on any given day of any given month,” the report observes, the kind of observation that just begs to be contradicted…