Harrison Pool

Has showers (including a wheelchair-accessible stall) open for unhomed people. Was treated very well here! Peace.

It would be easy to write a trite little review saying that this is an old, small and slightly shabby pool with showers that are as likely to be used by local homeless folks than swimmers (and for sure I've written my share of that sort of one-liner), but that would be missing the bigger picture.
The original Harrison Baths opened next door in 1909 with the precise purpose of providing sanitation to locals living without indoor plumbing. And given that this neighborhood is what was formerly known as The Ward, some 90% of the homes in the area lacked a bath and often even running water. So it's in fact highly appropriate that the showers for this pool are available free to anyone who needs to spruce themselves up and lacks the personal resources to do so. If taking a shower with a homeless person makes you feel uncomfortable, take a moment to wonder how they must be feeling.
The pool itself is a lovely anachronism at 20 yards long and three lanes wide. Well, "lovely" is a bit of a stretch. It's more like a pool only it's mother could love. The ceiling contains two of the meanest little skylights I've ever seen. There's no redeeming architectural features that I've noticed yet.
But I've experienced two wonderful things so far. One is that it's free, and it's less popular than the other City pools so it's easier to book a lane than at one of the cool-kids pools and you can often swim on into the next time slot if no-one else shows up. The other is that the staff are friendly, polite and sometimes even cheerful. And after 9 months and counting of the pandemic, that goes a long way to making my day better.
Finally, an apology to the lifeguard who watched with great nervousness for half an hour last week as I mangled every single flip turn I attempted. In my defense, I grew up swimming in the ocean and have only recently started teaching myself the art of the underwater turn and push from the wall by watching videos of YouTube.

Decent pool. Perfect location. But for God sake every time I visit that place I can see homeless people sleeping in changing rooms.
I guess, It feels like you came in prison shower. Horrible experience!
Kindly ask you to solve this issue.

Until that time I won't visit that pool!

This pool is my "back-up" pool when I am unable to make University Settlement hours. I quite disagree with what has been written, the pool is spotless and there has been some renovation in the women's change room since I was here in winter (Feb 2019). They've now created a wheelchair accessible, separate change room right next to the washrooms. The floors were pristine as well, and the pool itself had cool, clear water. The pool could use another buoy line or so, to better demarcate swim areas, but otherwise, I had a truly lovely swim here. Fantastic, free resource - way to go City of Toronto!

It is a toronto recreation center but it does not seem one. It was the closest swimming pool from my new workplace and I couldn't wait to check it. I found someone happily half-napping with her blanket, pillow and a number of dirty clothes right inside the sole female change room. She was also sometimes chatting with other swimmers. I went to the person in charge to inform that, all she did is go to the change room, told the napping lady that it was not allowed to sleep there and came back to her office. I thought of leaving but then changed my mind to give it a try. In the shower, the water has only one temperature which is super hot for shower. I swam for half an hour with half burnt body. When I came to change after few laps, the nap lady was still there and I had to find a corner to change. A number of people changing there had red rash on their body, i kind of felt scared that I just shared a pool with them. There was a big pile of clothes next to the hair dryer but I yet tried to use it a little bit to avoid catching cold. To my great surprise, there were tons of sanitary pads thrown in an open trash next to the dryer. Enough to run out of the pool.

Exploring a city is always fun!

It's dingy but it's free. It's kind of exactly what you'd expect. The pool is very small and the building doesn't look that well taken care of but it's an easily accessible location downtown and it's free so it works for a quick lane swim.