5 Closest Hotels to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP)

I gave birth in the middle of winter, so of course my concern was WHAT IF THERE IS A GIANT SNOW STORM? At that point, I wasn’t even thinking about the fact that I was planning to give birth at a Philadelphia city hospital and we live an hour away in the suburbs on a good day without traffic. In preparation for our baby’s arrival, I developed a 5-page word document for my family (yes, you read that right….5 pages) – slightly overkill you might think? Not to an extremely pregnant woman who needed to prepare for every little detail!

My document outlined the address, where I would be in the hospital,  parking options, and public transportation options (you know in case my family couldn’t GOOGLE the information and figure it out themselves!) Then I decided to put together a list of hotels in the area – in case there was a major weather event and we needed to camp out there before the baby or if my family got stuck in the city and couldn’t get back home.  Yes, slightly irrational thinking – but I’ll tell you – this hotel list ended up saving us!!

Photo Credit: http://www.uphs.upenn.edu/pennorl/education/residency/hospitals.html

There was no snow storm. There wasn’t even rain on the day our daughter was born. However, when I started having contractions at 2:00am on a Friday morning, then had a regularly scheduled doctor’s appointment IN THE CITY at 9:00am, and then he sent us back home to the SUBURBS – we had already had quite enough back and forth for one day.

My contractions started getting worse and we were facing a new challenge – rush hour on a Friday night. The only image going through my head was being forced to have our baby in a car because of being stuck in Philly gridlock traffic. Luckily – I had my handy dandy prepared list of hotels! It was about 3pm at this point, and we knew we still and time to beat the traffic.  My husband, Pat, suggested we go ahead and book a hotel for the night – that way if we had to go to the hospital in the middle of the night or even early the next morning, at least we would already be closer.

Photo Credit: http://homewoodsuites3.hilton.com/en/hotels/pennsylvania/homewood-suites-by-hilton-university-city-philadelphia-pa-PHLUPHW/index.html

We got to the hotel around 4:00pm and thank goodness we did! After having the car parked, checking in, and attempting to make our way to the room – my water broke in the hotel elevator!! We were only in the room for about 10 minutes, before we decided it was time to go to the hospital! Labor still lasted quite a while and we didn’t have our little one until 3:21 am on Saturday, but we are still glad we made the decision to head into the city early!

Here’s my list of hotels (and bed and breakfasts) closest to the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP), where I gave birth.  The list is organized by distance from the hospital: 

• The Hilton Inn at Penn – 0.6 miles from hospital
  • Website: http://www.theinnatpenn.com
  • Address: 3600 Sansom Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
  • Phone Number: 215-222-0200

• Sheraton University City – 0.6 miles from hospital
  • Website: http://www.philadelphiasheraton.com
  • Address: 3549 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
  • Phone Number: 215-387-8000

• Cornerstone Bed and Breakfast – 0.9 miles from hospital
  • Website: http://www.cornerstonebandb.com
  • Address: 3300 Baring Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
  • Phone Number: 215-387-6065

• Spruce Hill Manor Bed and Breakfast – 1 mile from hospital
  • Website: https://www.facebook.com/SpruceHillManor/
  • Address: 3709 Baring Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
  • Phone Number: 215-472-2213
  • ****SEE UPDATED NOTE AT END OF POST****

• Homewood Suites by Hilton University City – 1 mile from hospital
  • Website: http://www.homewoodunivcity.com/
  • Address: 4109 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104
  • Phone Number: 215-382-1111

We booked the Homewood Suites by Hilton University City for two nights. While we didn’t get to use the room that night, we offered it up to my in-laws to use after a long night in the hospital.  The second night, my husband used it to get some sleep on a comfy bed (intend of the pull out chairs in the hospital room) – it was nice because he was still close if we needed him to come back for anything!

Hopefully this list will help you too! Whether you are planning to give birth or if you are traveling to visit someone at the The Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania for other reasons!

****UPDATE AS OF 8/2021: This post originally listed Spruce Hill Manor Bed and Breakfast as a possible location to stay.  As of 8/2021, their website no longer exists, so I linked to their Facebook page, which I notice has not been updated since 2016.  This may no longer be an option to stay.

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