Where to stay in New York

In New York, you choose a neighbourhood before you choose a hotel. The Lower East Side suits anyone who goes out late and walks home from Chinatown. SoHo and Tribeca are quieter in the evening and charge the highest rates in the city. The West Village can be covered on foot but has few addresses. Midtown concentrates the large capacities and the shortest journeys to Grand Central. The Upper West Side remains residential, within reach of Central Park, and adds twenty minutes on the subway heading south. In Brooklyn, Williamsburg and Dumbo are advertised as one stop from Manhattan, which is true on paper: the L line crosses the East River in five minutes from Bedford Avenue. A weekend of engineering work or a service incident turns those five minutes into three quarters of an hour, and frequencies drop at night.

Two caveats are worth setting out before booking. New York hotel taxes add 14.75% of the room rate plus a flat 3.50 USD per night, and many properties also charge destination or facility fees, from 30 to 50 USD a night. Then floor area: below 200 USD a night, a New York room commonly falls below ten square metres.