<p>The hotels rates for family weekend are extremely inflated and pretty much sold out. There are some hotels ie. Residence Inn Northeast that are 7 miles away. How inconvenient is this for traveling back and forth to USC? Is it worth it to just pay the higher rates to be within a mile of the school? Any advice? Also if we fly down there then we won't have a car unless we rent (additional cost). </p>
<p>Last year- and this year we’re staying at Staybridge Suites, which is a bit closer but still not quite walking distance (2-3 miles) so it shouldn’t matter- 2 miles vs 10 miles even, either way, unless you find somewhere with shuttle service, you’d have to drive to the school, which provides free parking on campus. Other than that, the proximity of the hotel didn’t seem to matter last year. Once we were on campus, we pretty much stayed there the entire day, including our time at the football game- we were away from the hotel from early morning until after the football game. </p>
<p>So in my opinion, unless you can get somewhere closer that provides shuttle service so you don’t have to rent a car, I don’t think it’s worth it to pay a high price, especially since you may have to rent a car too. </p>
<p>Residence Inn Northeast is actually not as close as some places, but a straight shot in I-77/277 which becomes Bull Street which runs right into campus - so still only may 10 minutes. Closer to campus, but still not walkable, are hotels at I-77/Garners Ferry Road. Not beautiful area but minutes to area that’s not too far from campus (Target, Whole Foods, Moes, Wild Wings etc). but in terms of traffic not really quicker time wise.</p>
<p>We chose the Residence Inn because we can stay free but I was concerned about the commute to campus on a football weekend. We also will probably have to fly into Charlotte instead of Columbia due to airfares and convenience. Any thoughts on the commute from Charlotte??</p>
<p>The commute from Charlotte is not bad at all. My D just completed her freshman year at USC and most of her Northeast/midAtlantic friends fly out of Charlotte. I drove to parent’s weekend with my other daughter last year so that we would have a car, however my husband and son flew into Charlotte and used the Charlotte/Columbia shuttle service both ways with no issues at all. My d used that same shuttle whenever she flew home for breaks, etc. I thinks its about 80-90 miles?? or so. We have found that the flights from Columbia to Philadelphia are usually quite high. My d has also had friends take a bus to Myrtle Beach and fly out of there as well… cheaper airfaire,although definitely not as convenient as Charlotte</p>
<p>^please ignore the various mistakes in the above post…LOL…somehow I hit the submit button by mistake before I could edit it!</p>
<p>From Charlotte Airport to Columbia (especially where NE Residence Inn I located won’t be more the hour and a half. We go up there shopping all the time. This is not counting time spent at airport, but really not far and not a bad drive at all and a straight shot since except for airport expressway you are on I-77 all the way to Columbia…</p>