Even the parking lot smells new.

It’s 3 p.m. on Thursday and the Delta Toronto hotel is officially up and running. Or at least, jogging with a limp. I grab an overnight bag from my trunk. My 8-year-old daughters, who I’ve yanked from school an hour early for the sake of journalism, are covering their mouths and noses.

“It smells real bad,” they tell me, mumbling through fingers. “It smells bad!”

“That’s just fresh paint,” I say. “This is a brand new hotel! Isn’t that exciting?”

We amble toward an overhead sign that reads, “Elevator.” It leads to a stairwell. About 30 steps up, we emerge in the lobby, a gleaming expanse of fawn tiling, swivel chairs, purple throw pillows, majestic chandeliers and, at that precise moment, the highest concentration of welcoming and super-friendly human beings in the GTA.

“Hello!” “So great to have you!” “How can we help?” “Thanks for staying with us!”

A semi-circle quickly forms around us. My daughters are lavished with sticker books and travel-sized games. Everyone is beaming. Everyone is exuding fondness and gratitude. It feels less like checking in to a hotel and more like we have just landed on a remote island and told the gimlet-eyed castaways, “We’re here to rescue you!”

“We’ve upgraded you to a lake-view room,” a smiling woman tells me. “It’s the same rate as the room you booked. But we think you’ll love the view.”

Had the experience ended right there, I would lavish the new Delta Toronto with two thumbs up and five stars. Really. These were the nicest people I’ve ever met in a hotel lobby in North America, Europe or Asia.

But over the next 18 hours, something else became clear: friendliness can’t mask operational snafus and the Delta was premature in unlocking its doors. In fact, Thursday night’s grand opening felt rather like a botched dress rehearsal, only with full admission prices.

There were ladders and construction materials scattered about. There were buckets and dangling electrical panels in our hallway. We were the inaugural guests in Room 1410, a space so immaculate, we almost felt compelled to remove our shoes and wear forensic gloves.

But as pristine as it was, it was also a work in progress. The novelty of new can get old very fast when there is a gap between form and function.

The desk across from our two queen beds was armed with built-in charging plugs for various gadgets. What a great idea — had the chargers worked. The smart TV is designed to let guests upload their own content. But even getting the TV to work as a TV — a message popped up that read, “Weak or No Signal” — required a visit by an incredibly friendly “engineer.”

The bathtub was so antiseptic, you could have performed heart surgery on the acrylic surface. After the surgery, though, you would be out of luck if you wanted a bathrobe or shower gel.

There was no leather-bound book detailing hotel services, area attractions or in-room dining options. The reason? The Delta was not yet “set up” for room service.

This theme — “we’re not quite ready” — repeated itself and forced the incredibly friendly staff to improvise and outsource. You want juice at 10 p.m.? Well, you could try the Hasty Market across the street. Feel like going for a swim? Well, our pool is not yet open but our guests can use the InterContinental. Try not to get hypothermia. Why, yes, the promoted Char No. 5 “exclusive whisky bar” will be amazing — once we build it in that exclusive space over there.

Why was I here? To see what it’s like to be one of the first guests in a new big-city hotel. What did I learn? It might not be wise to be one of the first guests in a new big-city hotel.

If you’re charging guests upwards of $250 a night, shouldn’t everything be ready?

At the hotel’s restaurant, the SOCO Kitchen + Bar, they were testing the lights during dinner. It was like a planetarium show for Dark Side of the Moon. The next morning, a note was slipped under our door: “As we are in the final stages of our construction, we will be conducting a testing of the fire alarm system on Friday, November 28 between 10:30 a.m. — 10:45 a.m. During the testing, the fire alarm signal and strobe may be activated.”

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With the girls now begging for school, and all of us not keen to possibly get doused by the sprinkler system, we made our escape. My wife tried to buy a croissant at SOCO on the way out but was told breakfast service ended at 11, so she should try the Longo’s around the corner.

This would be perfectly reasonable had it not been 9 a.m.

On Thursday night, as I strolled around the hotel at Lower Simcoe and Bremner Blvd., a construction crew was hard at work in the dark. The hotel still needs to be connected to the city’s underground PATH system.

As one fellow told me: “There’s a lot of work to be done.”

Back inside, I gazed out my window at the maze of condos and skyscrapers dominating the vista of this lake-view room. That’s when it came into focus.

The Delta, I realized, is like the so-called “South Core” area itself: full of promise but still in need of time and vision to iron out the kinks, to find its identity.

In the future, you can see how this 567-room, 40-storey hotel will feel like a bit of connective tissue in the city, a membrane that connects the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, CN Tower, Rogers Centre, Ripley’s Aquarium, Union Station and the Union Pearson Express. You can see how the hotel will be jammed with visitors if the Leafs — OK, it’s more likely to be the Raptors — ever march toward a championship at the nearby Air Canada Centre.

But for now, that guy is right, there’s a lot of work to be done.

“How was your stay?” asked an incredibly friendly staffer during checkout.

“I’m not sure you guys were ready to be open,” I replied.

He looked on the verge of tears before coming to.

“We appreciate your feedback.”