Working well and being a good business model aren’t always the same. I can see that being especially hard in the US where high tech cities like SF or NYC have sky high rent making large spaces incredibly cost inefficient. That combined with what I assume to be relatively high overheads for equipment maintenance, training labor, insurance means you’re always operating with a very fine balance between capacity (not enough space or equipment) and membership (too many members or not enough members for the equipment everyone has). As soon as the membership drops below a threshold you’re instantly done for.
Our nearby university just launched a new Makerspace, but they were right in that it takes the American tax breaks of a non-profit, plus corporate backing (corporations can donate equipment for tax writeoffs in the US) to make it more sustainable at a valuable cost point.