Lodging Finder Post!

[revolutionaryjo]

For folks not in easy driving distance of the Twin Cities, you can use this post to find roommates to share a hotel room with or connect up with some of the locals who are able to host some attendees for the weekend!

The GPS Community Center is located at 1121 NE Jackson St., Minneapolis MN 55413. There are quite a few hotels in downtown Minneapolis that are an easy bus ride away. Google Maps should be able to give you the logistical lowdown on that, depending on which hotel you're looking up. Metro Transit also has your back.

Note: You may be tempted to stay at the University Inn off of 4th St as it's the closest hotel to the center, but trust me and do not do the thing. Maybe something has changed in the last decade since I lived in that area, but I know it as a place to avoid and am thus passing on this important info.

Locals, if you have some guest rooms or couch space you're able to spare, please chime in! Any space available at an individual's home is at their discretion, of course.

Comments

Re: Coordinating hotels

[klb]

Maybe The Grand Hotel Minneapolis or The Marquette?

According to hipmunk, the former is $159 per night and the latter is $139 per night. Though idk how that factors like having roommates might play into that pricing. I've just been going back and forth between hipmunk and yelp to try to find places that seem good and not too expensive... and eventually google maps to figure out the distance away on public transit would probably be a good thing to crosscheck, too, once options are narrowed down.

Re: Coordinating hotels

[intransitive]

definitely need to figure out the public transit thing. both those hotels look good to me! sufficiently cheap (with roommates) and they both are run by larger hotel chains that I have good experiences with.

I don't have any experience with Airbnb and would prefer a hotel just for the ability to not worry so much about cleaning or other things?

Re: Coordinating hotels

[eosrose]

I'm also down for the hotel plan. I don't mind a roommate, but I'm not confident in stepping outside the comfort zone of a hotel.

Even better if the hotel provides breakfast or is close to some good food choices... Unless we all decide to fundraise for some catering? But I don't think our group will be that big.

We're far enough out that maybe we start getting a headcount and negotiate a group rate for a hotel?

Re: Coordinating hotels

[bessyboo]

You can ask Jo because she'll know more about it, but especially if 4-6 ppl go through with the airbnb idea upthread, and the handful of people who are staying with locals, unless this gets SIGNIFICANTLY bigger than expected, I doubt there's going to be enough people for a hotel group rate.

However, most places in downtown Minneapolis proper are going to be both close to good food and an easy bus route 17 ride away from the meeting center.

Re: Coordinating hotels

[revolutionaryjo]

I thought I'd replied to this ten thousand years ago, but I guess not. Sorry! /o\

In my experience hotel group rates don't usually come without a financial risk, inasmuch that if you don't fill your room block you're on the line to pay the difference. So it's not something we're looking at doing right now since we're not actually holding the event in a hotel. But if there are people interested in getting at least 5 rooms somewhere I can make some calls!