Fire Separation Walls & Fire Sprinklers-

Another major factor that will influence your design significantly will be fire protection requirements.  Proximity of exterior walls to property lines and to other buildings may require that certain walls be constructed of an approved fire-protection assembly.  Openings in these walls may also be restricted to either no opens, or to a certain percentage of the overall wall surface dependent on these proximities.  And if you have multiple uses within a single building, the partitions between these uses may need to be constructed of approved assemblies.  You can review a great Wikipedia article on the subject here.

Fire sprinklers are often required, and are being increasingly recommended too.  And the use of sprinklers in some cases may buy you more allowed square footage, or may even reduce the need for fire walls in certain situations.

Equipment Layout-

The layout of kitchen and other equipment in food service businesses, the number and location of required sinks and other items by the Health Department, etc., can also have a strong influence on what is or isn't a workable design.  And since space is always at a premium, accuracy can be very important.  I have been handed kitchen equipment plans drawn up by the people selling the equipment only to find out an inch or two off here or there in the actual specifications of the listed equipment (not to mention the lack of accommodating ADA requirements) added up to a kitchen that had to be completely re-designed.  I would caution you against "free" design services from these companies.

Conclusion-

These are just a few of the most common issues I run into with new commercial clients and by no means is this a complete list of issues you may have to contend with.  But I hope at least providing a few of these most common ones will help smooth out what can be a very rough path if you are not aware of them, or have misconceptions about them.  But don't let any of this scare you off, just go into your project with your eyes open about some of these fundamental subjects of commercial tenant improvement design.

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