By MARTHA C. WHITE

Published: February 19, 2008

New York Times

Airport hotels are enjoying a renaissance of sorts as business travelers, frustrated by mounting delays and canceled flights, are leaving the terminal in search of the wider array of amenities available nearby.

The overnight occupancy rates at airport hotels rose 1.9 percent from October 2006 to October 2007, said Jan D. Freitag, vice president for global development for Smith Travel Research. “A 1.9 percent increase in demand is a fairly strong showing.” A growing number of business travelers are simply finding it more convenient to fly in, conduct business from an airport hotel and fly back out, Mr. Freitag said.

The airport hotels are also benefiting from business travelers decamping from busy terminals. The relative calm of the hotels can be reached right from within the airport or via a short, often free shuttle ride. Some travelers are using the hotels as a quiet place to open up a laptop and work or to have a meal at a hotel restaurant. Others are taking advantage of reduced day rates at some airport hotels to get a nap.

K L Daly, director for research and development for Continental Ltd., a transportation and logistics company, says she often tries to seek out an airport hotel with a full-service restaurant for some extra networking during a delay.

“Especially when you’re traveling with clients, when there are no seats in the terminal and you can’t talk privately,” Ms. Daly said, “taking them out of that environment allows you to take the negative situation of being stuck and turn it into a positive.”

Airport hotels are starting to court these nonlodging guests by introducing or enhancing amenities specifically aimed at them. At the Holiday Inn Dallas-Love Field, reachable by shuttle from the airport terminal, the restaurant is divided into zones, including one that faces a wall with cascading water meant to induce calm in frazzled travelers and a bar area where one of the TVs is regularly tuned to the Weather Channel.

In the adjacent lobby, terminals displaying arrival and departure details for Southwest Airlines, which has its hub at Love Field, allow travelers to check on a flight’s status without having to return to the terminal or call the carrier.

Sue Morgan, vice president for franchise food and beverage at Holiday Inn’s parent company, Intercontinental Hotels Group, says the various amenities aimed at delayed and connecting passengers have worked so well that the company is planning on replicating them at a new property set to open next year near the Denver airport.

Sandy Leblanc, general manager of the Philadelphia Airport Marriott, said there had been an increase in visitors using the hotel’s lobby and restaurant, especially when weather creates many delays. “Whenever there’s a delayed flight at the airport, we get an influx of people working on their laptops or conducting meetings,” Ms. Leblanc said.

As a result, the hotel has introduced a wireless Internet access plan for travelers who want to log on for just a couple of hours. The hotel is rearranging the furniture in the lobby to accommodate the periodic spikes in traffic and considering whether to expand limited food service to the lobby area to augment the restaurant.

A thornier question, Ms. Leblanc said, was how to deal with the travelers who set up camp in the restaurant to work on their laptop or conduct an impromptu meeting without buying any food. She said the hotel was moving toward instituting a $32 table fee for travelers who turn restaurant tables into temporary desks without buying anything. Food purchases, she said, would be credited against the table fee.

At some airport hotels, travelers can rent more than just a table. At the Fairmont Vancouver Airport hotel, for example, travelers can check into a guest room at a day rate that starts at one-quarter of the property’s standard $399 overnight rate. The hotel’s general manager, Dan McGowan, says some travelers use the time and the space to nap, while others conduct impromptu meetings or use the space as a private workstation.

Revenue generated by these daytime room occupancies has gone up by 5 percent in the last year, Mr. McGowan said.

Offering reduced day rates for stranded travelers is even catching on among hotels that are not full service. Tracey Toback, a podiatrist, was scheduled to be on an early-morning flight to a medical conference last year, only to face a five-hour delay when he arrived at the airport in Newburgh, N.Y.

“I had a lot of work to do. I was up really late the night before and just figured I’d sleep on the plane,” he said. Dr. Toback said he ruled out napping in the fluorescent-lighted terminal and instead took a shuttle bus to the Ramada Newburgh-West Point where, for a $50 daytime access rate, he was able to get a room and some sleep.

Aside from eating, working and sleeping, some travelers use their delay time to sneak in a workout or a spa treatment. At the Fairmont Vancouver Airport hotel, the spa area includes treatment rooms, a sauna, pool and fitness area. In the last year alone, use of the spa by day visitors was up 15 percent, according to Wendy Lisogar-Cocchia, president of the Absolute Spa Group, which manages the Fairmont spa.

“It’s definitely a trend,” Ms. Lisogar-Cocchia said.