Pod 39 hotel room

Murray Hill residents are unhappy with the allegedly raucous behavior outside the Pod 39 hotel at 145 East 39th Street, the New York Post reported.

Neighbors have complained to the city and the 367-room, 17-story hotel regarding loud music, partying outside the building and the smell of urine. They worry their property values will plummet, the Post said. [more]

400 West 42nd Street

A pair of developers is moving forward with plans to build a 510-room pod-style hotel project in Times Square, filing plans to demolish three low-rise buildings near the corner of West 42nd Street and Ninth Avenue to make way for a 28-story tower. Developers the Friedman Group and Landis Group are partnering to build the 220,000-square-foot project at 400 West 42nd Street on parcels they acquired for about $80 million before the market collapsed, Robert Friedman, a principal with the Friedman Group, told The Real Deal. [more]

From left: Yotel entrance and a room in the Pod Hotel on East 51st Street

A new breed of hotels featuring small, inexpensive rooms is expanding in New York City to serve its ever-expanding tourism industry, the New York Times reported. What started with the opening of BD Hotels’ 345-room Pod Hotel, at 230 East 51st Street, in 2007, and continued with the 669-room Yotel’s opening last year at 42nd Street and 10th Avenue, is becoming a growing trend. BD Hotels is planning to open a second Pod hotel with 366 rooms later this month in the old Allerton House at 145 East 39th Street. Over the next two years citizenM will open hotels on West 50th Street in Times Square and 185 Bowery in Nolita. [more]

The interior of a room at the Pod Hotel

Affordable hotel, the Pod, in Midtown is opening a new sister location, which will be called Pod 39, Crain’s reported. The existing budget hotel, at 230 East 51st Street, has spawned a second location, which will open in June in Murray Hill. The developer, BD Hotels, bought the 17-story building at 145 East 39th Street, between Lexington and Third avenues, in 2010 for $28 million, Crain’s said. Room rates will start at $119 per night. BD is in talks to open hotels in Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., Crain’s said. [Crain's]

From the creators of European airport “pod” hotels comes what could be the city’s largest hotel opening next year. Yotel, which launched three years ago by offering four-hour hotel stays to business travelers, is opening a 669-room hotel on 42nd Street and 10th Avenue. The 25-story tower, at the site of the Related Companies’ $800 million West Side residential complex, will cater to a somewhat less transient crowd. Not to be confused with the Pod Hotel at 230 East 51st Street, which caters to a younger clientele with bunk beds offered up for less than $100 per night, rooms at the new Yotel will be twice the size of Yotel’s airport pods and will cost between $200 and $250 per night. Yotel partners Simon Woodroffe and Gerard Greene said longer-term hotels have always been in their plans — their $285 million deal with Related was signed more than two years ago — but they’ve made mistakes, particularly in construction, as their company has grown. They said New York’s Yotel, which was designed by Rockwell and is already half-built, will cost £20,000 — around $27,054 — per room to build. IFA Hotels & Resorts backed the project and Woodroffe and Greene said their investment will have paid off within six to seven years’ time. [Financial Times]