During the first day of Virginia's smoking ban, at least one business had signs asking patrons to pardon the mess during construction to comply with the law.

Crews at the NRV Superbowl in Christiansburg are building a 1,200-square-foot smoking room to comply with the law, which took effect Tuesday. Smoking is now banned in restaurants, bars and other food establishments that don't have a separately walled and ventilated smoking area.

The Superbowl's $40,000 to $50,000 smoking room should be complete in two to three weeks, said general manager Terry Stike.

The room, while keeping smokers happy, is also meant to keep nonsmokers from having to walk through a cloud of smoke on the way inside, Stike said.

"Families and nonsmokers love it, but the smokers have to go somewhere," he said. "If they can't smoke in here, where else are they going to go besides outside around the door?"

The bowling alley was already nonsmoking before 10 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, Stike said.

Other reactions to the statewide ban were mixed at New River Valley restaurants, including She-Sha Cafe and Hookah Lounge, a hookah bar in downtown Blacksburg popular with Virginia Tech students.

A hookah is a tall, multistemmed glass pipe filled with flavored tobacco, usually smoked socially.

The lounge will not close because of the ban, owner Paul Santos said.

"We want to continue doing business as close to before as possible," Santos said. "The time may come when we have to make some changes."

He declined to elaborate, saying only that management had worked with a lawyer and authorities to take "what we think are the correct steps" to stay open under the new law.

Because the ban is specifically for restaurants and bars, smoking is still allowed in hookah and cigar bars if they sell only prepackaged food, according to the Virginia Department of Health.

Enforcement of the ban falls to local health departments, with a fine of no more than $25 for establishments that violate the ban. Individuals will face the same fine for smoking in a smoke-free area.

Proceeds go to the Virginia Health Care Fund, according to the department's Web site.

A restaurant cannot be shut down for failing to comply with the smoking law, said Gary Hagy, who directs the state health department's food and environmental services division.

Officials from the New River Health District could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

Exemptions to the law include private clubs, outdoor areas of restaurants and separately ventilated rooms exclusively for smokers that have at least one public entrance into the nonsmoking area.

The exemptions add up to too many loopholes in the law, such as the smoking rooms, said Mark Shrader, owner of Bull & Bones Brewhaus & Grill in Blacksburg.

"I just don't think the law is written correctly," he said. "It may or may not adversely affect us, but I think if we bring a good enough product to the table, whether you're smoking or nonsmoking, people come back."

The main dining room has always been nonsmoking at Bull & Bones. Smoking is allowed at the bar. The restaurant has two smoke-eating machines, which cost about $10,000 apiece, to clear the air around the bar.

"We knew eventually it [the smoking ban] was going to happen, so I don't think it was a waste of money," Shrader said. "It was worth it for the year we've been open and had smoking."

And some patrons, smokers or not, say they just don't like the government telling them what to do, he said.

"The biggest complaint I've heard, even from nonsmokers, is that it really shouldn't be up to the government to decide," Shrader said.

In anticipation of the ban, the inside of Bud Foster's Restaurant in Blacksburg went smoke-free in May.

"Yeah, we've lost some business because of it," said bartender Grant Foster, son of Virginia Tech defensive coordinator Bud Foster, whom the bar was named after. "But we've also gained some of that business back because we're nonsmoking."

Before then, smoking was allowed only at the bar. Smoking is still allowed on the restaurant's patio.

Management debated making the necessary renovations to enclose the bar to comply with the law, but decided it wasn't worth the costs, owner Robert Hodges said in May.

"To be honest, we would be spending $30,000 to $40,000 to retain maybe 3 or 4 percent of our clients, most of whom don't mind going outside to smoke," he said then.

Sharkey's in Blacksburg already has an enclosed, separately ventilated room in the back, so it will become the smoking area, said owner Stephanie Rogel. The restaurant's Radford location has an outdoor patio that is now the smoking area.

Rogel also said she thinks a smoke-free environment will draw business because many nonsmokers don't like smoky bars.

As a former smoker, Rogel said she's personally in favor of the law, and she thinks it will help people quit smoking.

"You need to have a high level of consciousness when you quit smoking so you don't start up again," she said. "When you drink, your consciousness goes down so you might start smoking again."

Butch Keith, a maintenance contractor from Dublin doing construction on the NRV Superbowl's smoking room and a smoker himself, said he likes the new law.

"I'm in favor of it, even though I smoke," he said. "It'll probably help me quit."

Keith said he doesn't smoke in his home or around his kids, around nonsmoking friends or at football games, so he's used to stepping outside to have a cigarette.

"I just smoked at the bowling alley because I could," he said.