The place where I used to shoot when I lived in Los Angeles met a lot of the criteria on the list: membership or pay by the hour, about 40 lanes, 50 yards, good up to at least .223 that I know of, retail gun shop, instruction, food, smoking, a bar.
I would like the cigar area to be seperate from the shooting area, because I personally don't like the smell of cigars (please don't kill me).
I would want to be able to shoot relatively close as I only have a handgun.
Manchester Firing Line has columns in the middle of their range - and yes, they obviously get hit from time to time judging by the missing paint on them.
If you are looking at a building that has columns in the middle of the area where the range would go - I would offer a suggestion that building a wall down the line where the columns go, thereby sectioning off the lanes more discretely - and getting rid of the danger of richochets off of the columns - might be a way to solve the problem.
Having walls at intervals between the lanes also gives you the ability to shut down portions of the range - instead of the whole range - if there is a problem in one lane. Also might help to avoid cross shooting in the lanes.
There is probably a reason not to do this and I just haven't thought of it. I notice that most indoor ranges I have been to do not section off like this.
Thanks for that link, I had forgotten about that one thread.
Some great ideas guys.
My concern with the columns are being able to run IDPA events and having limited 40' lane. An idea I was thinking was having stages across the 3 different sections (each running only one at time). So you would start left to right.
For a 2 or 3 gun match this could be neat. Start rifle from back and have to advance forward. Get to 100' line and take door to right. Start 2nd stage. move forward 25' then go third with retreat back to 75' and finish?
Waiting to hear about clearing columns from part of the range so I wouldn't have to think about the above.