Starwood expands keyless hotel doors

Starwood expands keyless hotel doors

The keyless experiment was a success. That is the only conclusion to be drawn from the announcement that Starwood Hotels and Resorts is expanding the use of technology that lets guests use their smartphones to open their hotel doors.

Connecticut-based Starwood tested the technology at 10 hotels in 2014 and has now expanded it to 130 hotels and resorts in 30 countries. The hotel company said last week that it was installing the technology in select Le Meridien, Westin, Sheraton and Four Points properties over the next few months.

To open a hotel room using this technology, guests must be enrolled in the Starwood loyalty program and must download the Starwood Preferred Guest app.

Already 350,000 loyalty reward members have registered to use the keyless feature, Starwood said, and the feature is being used most often at its hotels in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Dallas and Miami.

Park service gets $90 million to fix Memorial Bridge

WASHINGTON

The National Park Service has been awarded a $90 million federal grant to repair the rapidly decaying Arlington Memorial Bridge.

Members of Congress from Northern Virginia and the District of Columbia announced the grant last week.

Without the money, the park service had warned that Washington’s most recognizable bridge would have to close by 2021.

The 84-year-old bridge needs to be completely reconstructed at a cost of $250 million. Its steel supports are rusting through, and its concrete decking has been reduced to gravel.

The grant will allow the park service to start planning and lining up contractors to begin construction in early 2018.

The bridge connects the Lincoln Memorial with Arlington National Cemetery and was built to commemorate the reunification of the United States after the Civil War.

Geography quiz

Q. Corfu Channel separates the Greek island of Corfu from which neighboring country?

A. Albania. During the 1940s after World War II, it was the site of three incidents involving Royal Navy ships and Albania that resulted in the United Kingdom suing Albania in the International Court of Justice.

Combined dispatches