    a motor hotel (shortened to motel) is a hotel designed for motorists, and usually has a parking area for motor vehicles. entering dictionaries after world war ii, the word motel, coined in 1925 as a portmanteau of motor and hotel or motorists' hotel, referred initially to a type of hotel consisting of a single building of connected rooms whose doors faced a parking lot and, in some circumstances, a common area; or a series of small cabins with common parking. motels are often individually owned, though motel chains do exist. as the provincial highways and the united states highway system began to develop in the 1920s, long-distance road journeys became more common, and the need for inexpensive, easily accessible overnight accommodation sited close to the main routes led to the growth of the motel concept. motels peaked in popularity in the 1960s with rising car travel, only to decline in response to competition from the newer chain hotels which became commonplace at highway interchanges as traffic was bypassed onto newly constructed freeways. several historic motels are listed on the u.s. national register of historic places, the united states federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation. ==architecture==    motels differ from hotels in their location along highways, as opposed to the urban cores favored by hotels, and their orientation to the outside (in contrast to hotels, whose doors typically face an interior hallway). motels almost by definition include a parking lot, while older hotels were not usually built with automobile parking in mind. because of their low-rise construction, the number of rooms which would fit on any given amount of land was low compared to the high-rise urban hotels which had grown around railway stations. this was not an issue in an era where the major highways became main street in every town along the way and inexpensive land 
Hotel_types Motels Tourist_accommodations