You pretty much know exactly what you are going to get when you stay at any Marriott hotel: a big bill that usually exceeds the value product.

Let me just say I couldn't have been much happier about the room. We had a comfortable king sized bed. There was a walk in closet, desk, a mini-fridge and a chair, and the staff at the front desk were extremely friendly and helpful. Unfortunately that is pretty much where the positives come to an end.

For starters, the thermostat did not work half the time on one side of the room. Fortunately it was on the side opposite of the bed, because it was about zero degrees out at night and the heater was just blowing out cool air even when I bumped the thermostat up to 80 degrees!!

The website says Marriott charges a fee for wireless internet. I cannot tell you how many low budget hotels we passed on the drive to Pittsburgh which openly advertise FREE WiFi. Maybe 5 or 10 years ago it made sense to charge for wireless internet, but in this day and age it should be included in the room!! Now in fairness, I did try to connect my iPad to the wireless internet and it never prompted me to have a password or anything. Of course, my iPad would connect to the server but would not be able to actually do anything online.

The Marriott offers a wide variety of foods for breakfast. The only problem? You'll have to pay something like $9-11 to enjoy them!! Seriously, have they ever heard of a continental breakfast? Almost every other hotel I have stayed at would at least provide coffee, juice, bagels and other breakfast foods each morning. I mean, as much as they charge for a room you would think that could be included!!!

This was our first time visiting Pittsburgh and we thought staying downtown would be ideal. I mean, wouldn't that be where all the good restaurants and nightlife is? Uh uh, not in the Steel City!! I don't think there was a restaurant open within walking distance of the hotel, which is seriously next to the Consol Energy Center if that matters to you We had to take the T (trolley/subway which the nearest station is about 2 blocks away) to the Market Square area. Along the way we found CVS stores that closed at 7:00pm on a Friday night and many other bars and restaurants were also calling it a night by 9:00!!

It was way too cold to be walking around Pittsburgh, so after one failed attempt to venture into downtown we decided it would be best to drive. They charge $22 a day to park with in and out privileges. I say "they" because the Marriott does not actually own the parking garage. Still, $22 is nothing to sneeze at especially given how much they charge for a room. And there is seriously NO free parking in the entire downtown area. I had to park illegally a few times just to run into Dunkin Donuts or something to pick up breakfast!!

If I want to nitpick some more, there was no phone book in the room to look up places to eat or visit. Also, the television was rather small for the hotel room. Ok, I get that people don't travel to stay in their hotel rooms to watch television, but I have a bigger screen in my office at home than they have in their hotel rooms. The remote control would work sporadically. It just depends on what angle your held it.

About what you'd expect--nice room and location, restaurants in the lobby, and good service. I was disappointed when they would not extend my parking for an extra 3 hours after checkout, but their explanation that the garage was privately owned made a little sense. I didn't eat in the bar/restaurant and I didn't use any of the other facilities. The maid was friendly and didn't mess up my pile of stuff in my room.

I stay here every other week and th staff is friendly in all areas of the hotel. The rooms have been updated and there's a full service Starbucks downstairs!

The fitness center is a decent size and the TVs on the treadmills and such are large screens and open 24/7.

We held a meeting yesterday at the Marriott and everything worked well. Our meetings are somewhat complicated, as we required multiple meeting rooms with different setups and two groups of attendees that had different food and beverage requirements. Here are the reasons why it was a great venue for our meetings.

- Meeting space size was more than enough for us. Clean and spacious
- All working outlets (seems simple enough but you'd be surprised how many hotels I have had issues with this)
- Functional and soundproofed airwalls.
- Banquet food was excellent
- Banquet and sales staff, especially Olivia, Betsy, and William were all there when we needed them
- Good value overall for what we received
- AV tech was competent and helpful
- Engineering was available quickly for a request I had while setting up our equipment
- Good hotel location, and secure; security came around a few times while I was setting up our a/v later in the evening. Since we have expensive electronic equipment, seeing a security presence alleviated any concerns I may have otherwise had.

Overall, would I choose the Pittsburgh Marriott City Center again? Absolutely.