[Talk-us] motel vs. hotel

[Jack Burke]

"Motel" is a contraction of "motor hotel." The term motor hotel originated with the idea of a hotel that you drove up and parked outside the door to your room. 

So, the original defining characteristic of a motel is a hotel with doors opening outside to the parking lot. 

Today, many motels are multi-story, and some have rooms facing an interior courtyard, but I'd still call them motels, and retain the term "hotel" for lodging facilities with rooms opening to an interior hallway. 

Fun fact: the word "hotel" is descended from the middle French word "hostel," and both words are in active use in modern French, but with slightly different meanings. 

-Jack

-- 
Typos courtesy of fancy auto spell technology

On March 9, 2019 8:41:38 AM CST, Brian Stromberg <brian.stromberg at gmail.com> wrote:
>The only clear definition that has come across this list is whether the
>rooms open to the outdoors or to a hallway. All of the others are way
>too
>subjective to be useful to anyone trying to decide how to tag it.
>
>--
>Brian
>
>
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