Short
summer seasons limit many of the recreation businesses in the northern areas of
the US and Canada. Go-carting, mini-golf, waterslides and splash parks, along
with dozens of other outdoor summer events cease in early fall and do not
recommence until late spring. The primary reason is weather.
The
entertainment businesses that attempt to defy this simple barrier to being open
for longer durations experience prohibitive costs. Virtually the only
waterslides that remain open are those located inside hotels. Mini-golf
facilities close shop when the ground freezes. A few go-cart operations have
found homes in old warehouses, but the facilities are pricey, taxes high and
maintenance and insurance costs on the old buildings unreasonable.
Yet, fabric
buildings offer a cost-effective alternative. With the ability to build clear
spans exceeding three hundred feet and ceiling heights more than one-third of
that size, almost any summer sport can be housed indoors and offer nearly
year-round availability. A few driving ranges, opened more than two decades ago
in fabric buildings, have found a niche and a profit path that seasonal
operators would do almost anything to achieve.
Because of
the design and materials used in tension fabric structures, almost all of the
space becomes useable, while wood, concrete or steel buildings must incorporate
buffers, design for support beams and posts that interrupt the flow of the
building and consider the limitation of ceiling height in selecting a business
in the buildings.
Batting
cages, driving ranges, mini-golf, soccer and football and even full-fledged
baseball operations easily can be held in a fabric building, extending seasons
and revenue flow while incurring only modest operating and capital costs for
infrastructure.
Small communities
struggle to find a way to offer sporting venues and recreation opportunities
for their residents in winter. Most frequently, they are limited to
conventional winter sports. Yet, a small fabric building can house waterslides,
splash parks and track and field facilities.
Go cart
racing is simply the starting point for similar activities. Dirt bike tracks,
mountain biking and so on fit well in the tension fabric structure. Archery, short-range gun and target shooting
and similar sports are also possible.
With the
range of recreation businesses that can be housed in fabric and poly-fabric
buildings, new doors are opened for would-be entrepreneurs, in rural towns
across Canada and the USA, either operated in partnership with the community,
in a private partnership relying on local investors or as a privately owned
business.
