Are these pictures upside-down, or is that just the sign?

Either way it's still pretty funny

Posted by: Entropy at January 27, 2006 11:11 AM

The pictures are not upside down. In the picture, the far side of the AC unit touches the wall... so what you see in the pictures is what you see when you walk up to the AC and try to use it.

Posted by: Mark Hurst at January 27, 2006 11:20 AM

I've stayed in the Boston Park Plaza and the heating system is the least of the annoyances.

Two nights in a row, at approximately midnight or 1 AM, we were jolted out of a sound sleep by a blaring automated announcement warning us that there was a fire and we needed to evacuate the building immediately.

Since we were on about the 20th floor, this was quite a trek. On at least one night (and maybe both -- memory is a trifle hazy) this happened twice in the same night.

It was never clear why the alarm went off -- rumors were that it was either a malfunctioning fireplace in the bar or a flaky smoke alarm. My guess was is the former.

It's a nice hotel, other than that (and the fact that they allow [or at least did at the time I was there] smoking in the lobby, which makes this smoke-averse Californian's eyes water). I hope they got their act together.

Posted by: Steve at January 27, 2006 11:26 AM

This is a good place to put a plastic rat!

Posted by: Dan at January 27, 2006 04:11 PM

Luckily for my brother, he does in fact have a degree in mechanical engineering, so I would go to the hotel with him ; )

Posted by: Bob at January 27, 2006 08:27 PM

I actually showed this to me brother (masters in mech engineering) and he said you'd need a HVAC mech engineer (he thought he was being funny, lol).

Posted by: Mike at January 27, 2006 08:46 PM

Also I am thinking that this was rewired to use an external thermostat. I never understood the whole put the thermostat inside the A/C.

Posted by: Mike at January 27, 2006 08:47 PM

Is the greater problem here the complexity or the incompleteness/illegibility?

It looks like half of the instructions have been torn off, in patches.

Posted by: Josephc4 at January 27, 2006 11:53 PM

no offense, but i think the control panel thing just got broken off or was move to the side. Seems to me just to be something the hotel needs to fix

Posted by: SammyC at January 29, 2006 01:40 AM

--"Two nights in a row, at approximately midnight or 1 AM, we were jolted out of a sound sleep by a blaring automated announcement warning us that there was a fire and we needed to evacuate the building immediately."--

If you heard the alarm on the 20th floor, it was because there was an incident on your floor, or the floor directly above or below you. The systems in multi-story buildings are not designed to evacuate the entire building. Just the floor of the fire along with the one (or sometimes two) floors above and below the fire. The rest of the building either doesn't know or is told to "stand by". Someone smoking in the lobby shouldn't cause the entire building to be evacuated (unless someone trying to silence the alarm pressed an "all call" button).

Most false alarms are caused by poor maintenance, usually on the part of the building owner who doesn't want to spend the money on maintaining a system designed to save your life. They would rather spend it on fancy decorations in the lobby. Next time this happens ask the manager when the last time the fire alarm system was inspected. If it was over a year, go to another hotel, and then call the local fire marshal. The threat of having the hotel shut down will solve one annoyance!

Posted by: Charles at January 29, 2006 11:49 AM

hmm, thats odd. i have stayed @ the Park Plaze & have had no issues with the HVAC or fire alarms.

mebbe i was just lucky, lol

however, this particular unit does seem a little odd, as determined just from the pics

Posted by: freedomlinux at January 29, 2006 09:56 PM

Charles says:

If you heard the alarm on the 20th floor, it was because there was an incident on your floor, or the floor directly above or below you.

On the contrary. In this case the entire building was evacuated. The alarms were definitely not confined to one or two floors. I was staying there for a conference on which I serve as part of the conference committee. In our nightly meeting the next night the general building evacuation was a topic of conversation, in this case, I'm certain that the alarm went off on all floors.

Posted by: Steve at January 30, 2006 10:00 AM

It's unusual that the entire building was evacuated, but it does still happen. Usually multi-story buildings aren't designed for a full evacuation. Example: What happens when everyone tries to leave a major city at 5:00? Emergency stairs and exits aren't designed to handle the load. Multi-story buildings should be designed with fire/smoke blocking between floors and sprinklers to help contain the fire. However I'm not aware of the specific construction of this hotel. Maybe the hotel doesn't have these safeguards in place. Or maybe the fire alarm was designed by someone who didn't know better. I wouldn't stay there if this was the case. But also someone randomly pressing buttons on the fire alarm panel trying to unsuccessfully silencing it could have pressed a button to cause the announcement to play throughout the entire building. Something is broken here, just not sure what!

Posted by: Charles at January 31, 2006 11:18 PM

To quote Charles: "Usually multi-story buildings aren't designed for a full evacuation. Example: What happens when everyone tries to leave a major city at 5:00? Emergency stairs and exits aren't designed to handle the load."

Hello? Does anyone remember 9/11 and the World Trade Center? If the stairs are not designed to evacuate the entire building then I will spend my time at B&B's or one or two story cheap motels with hookers and crackheads! I would rather take my chances in a dicey neighborhood than in a building not designed to evacuate all of the quests at once.

If anything is broken, THIS BUILDING CODE IS BROKEN!

Yikes! Thanks for the wakeup call, Charles!

Posted by: Contract Soft-where? Developer at February 17, 2006 12:09 AM

If you look though the vents on the left, you will see the controls. in the picture with the instructions, they are upside down, so is the entire cover. you dont need a 'mechanical engineering degree' just a screw driver. Or you could just call the front desk and have them fix it. NOT broken just bad matenance

Posted by: Belgerath at February 18, 2006 06:10 PM

>>>It looks like half of the instructions have been torn off, in patches.>>>

Well, yeah, that is what I would do if I found a plastic rat in there, was false alarm fire evacuated at 1AM, and my wife would not have sex with me at 1:30AM !!!

Jonathan

Posted by: Jonathan at February 20, 2006 05:48 AM

Well, to me, if the picture is NOT upside down, then the heater is atached to the roof. Ive never seen a heater in a hotel room attached to the roof.

Posted by: Kyle at March 8, 2006 06:40 AM