Plant Bath Swimming Pool

Heritage: The Plant Bath Pool has had a remake, sitting at a historically very busy corner of Preston and Somerset.  It is one of Ottawa's favourite lap swimming pools, with a modern makeover.  The old pool was narrower and similar to the Champagne Bath pool on King Edward Ave.  Now the old pool is the gym, and, there is a new pool addition and weight room.  This is a wonderful renovation that has preserved the essence of Plant Bath while adding significant value to the immediate neighbourhood and the city at large.

Oddly, the change-room in the old pool / building was on the second story and after exiting the change-room, one descended some metal steps to the pool.  A great pool even then, my mother remembers going there as a child around in the WWII era.  In another entry, I'll talk briefly about Plouffe Park and the massive WWII depot that was built beside the pool.  When I asked my mother about this, she said, "Oh, that was the army". Intrigued, I tried to photograph it and find out some more, and I will detail what I know in a future post.

It is clear that this historic part of Ottawa is vital to today's culture and urbanism of today's Ottawa, as it was then.  It forms Ottawa's crossroads to Chinatown, the Italian district and Hintonburg, with the former Lebreton Flats area to the north.  From Plant Bath corner down to the flats, there are still buildings that would be very reminiscent of the flats.  Apartments that are very intriguing, and I'll try to cover those in the near future as well.

As always, these posts are more "shells" than properly researched articles -- so please jump in with details. As my username says, "willfixlater".