Where to live in Port St. Lucie
Port St. Lucie is 119 square miles of land and 268,062 people on the Census Bureau's estimate for July 2025, up from 204,826 in 2020, and it was a land sale before it was a city: General Development Corporation bought about 40,000 acres along the North Fork of the St. Lucie River in 1958, the City was incorporated in 1961 under its ownership, and the company platted more than 80,000 quarter-acre lots, laced with canals. One school district, St. Lucie Public Schools, covers every address, and the seventeen levies on a tax bill are the same in every guide, so what the neighborhood decides here is everything else: whether a community development district's assessment comes with the lot, how close the North Fork or a canal runs, whether an older house is still on a well and septic tank, how far the street is from the newer city to the west, and whether the address is in the City at all or in one of the unincorporated enclaves inside its outline. These are 20 neighborhood guides, filterable by area below.
Browse dedicated pages for St. Lucie West and Torino across to St. Lucie North, Northport Village and Swan Park, Oak Hammock and Palm Trails across to Bayshore Heights, Floresta Gardens and Riverview, Gatlin Pines and Rosser Reserve down to Becker Ridge, with Whispering Pines and Southbend Lakes, Lyngate and Sandpiper Bay across the river and Sandhill Crossing past US 1, Tradition and Verano west of Interstate 95.
20 communities across the city
A start on a city of about 268,000 people, drawn on the City's own map of 36 neighborhoods, which takes in 99.8% of its residents, so every guide is one neighborhood exactly as the City draws it. Filter by area of the city, then page through the rest.
Bayshore Heights
The City's Bayshore Heights neighborhood on Bayshore Boulevard between Crosstown Parkway and Port St. Lucie Boulevard, 1,049 acres and about 6,100 residents, with City Hall, the police headquarters and Bayshore Elementary inside.
Becker Ridge
The City's Becker Ridge neighborhood where Becker Road meets Florida's Turnpike, 902 acres and about 4,200 residents at the southern edge of the city's grid, bounded by the C-23 canal and the Martin County line.
Floresta Gardens
The City's Floresta Gardens neighborhood between Crosstown Parkway, Floresta Drive, Whitmore Drive and Airoso Boulevard, 918 acres and about 5,600 residents, with Kiwanis and Doat Street parks inside and Floresta Elementary just outside.
Gatlin Pines
The City's Gatlin Pines neighborhood on Gatlin Boulevard south of the C-24 canal, 1,429 acres and about 9,100 residents on the platted grid between Rosser and Port St. Lucie boulevards.
Lyngate
The City's Lyngate neighborhood between the North Fork and US 1, from Port St. Lucie Boulevard to the city limit just past Crosstown Parkway, 1,618 acres and about 4,400 residents, with Lyngate Park, the boat ramps at Veterans Park at Rivergate and Tom Hooper Park inside.
Northport Village
The City's Northport Village neighborhood between Florida's Turnpike and the North Fork north of Prima Vista Boulevard, 1,821 acres and about 9,800 residents, with Northport K-8 and Sportsman's Park inside.
Oak Hammock
The City's Oak Hammock neighborhood beside Interstate 95 south of Crosstown Parkway, 1,036 acres and about 5,200 residents around Oak Hammock Park, with the school of the same name in Palm Trails next door.
Palm Trails
The City's Palm Trails neighborhood between Crosstown Parkway and the C-24 canal, bounded by California, Cashmere and Del Rio boulevards, 1,323 acres and about 8,400 residents, with Oak Hammock K-8 inside.
Riverview
The City's Riverview neighborhood on the west bank of the North Fork where Crosstown Parkway crosses it, 1,157 acres and about 6,600 residents, with the Port St. Lucie Community Center, Whitmore Park and Floresta Elementary inside.
Rosser Reserve
The City's Rosser Reserve neighborhood on Rosser Boulevard and Paar Drive beside Interstate 95, 2,072 acres and about 10,200 residents of the southern grid, with O.L. Peacock Sr. Park and its lake inside.
Sandhill Crossing
The City's Sandhill Crossing neighborhood, 5,665 acres and about 19,200 residents, the most populous of the City's neighborhoods, with HCA Florida St. Lucie Hospital, Port St. Lucie High School and the MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Event Center inside.
Sandpiper Bay
The City's Sandpiper Bay neighborhood east of the North Fork and south of Port St. Lucie Boulevard, 3,366 acres and about 6,500 residents, with the Port St. Lucie Botanical Gardens, the Saints golf course and the Morningside library inside.
Photographs: Port St. Lucie City Hall by Birbie28, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons · Stars and Stripes Park at night by Serge Yatunin, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons · Port St. Lucie Botanical Gardens by Serge Yatunin, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons · Port St. Lucie Boulevard by formulanone from Huntsville, United States, CC BY-SA 2.0, Wikimedia Commons · Holy Family Catholic Church by Nheyob, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons.
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Showing 1–12 of 20 communities
The five areas at a glance
None of these five is drawn by the City. They are the names people here use, set on the lines Port St. Lucie already divides itself by: Interstate 95, Florida's Turnpike, Crosstown Parkway, the C-24 canal, the North Fork of the St. Lucie River and US 1. Where one area stops and the next begins is our judgment rather than a map anybody publishes.
| Area | Neighborhoods | Character |
|---|---|---|
| St. Lucie West and Torino across to St. Lucie North, Northport Village and Swan Park | Northport Village, St. Lucie North, St. Lucie West, Swan Park, Torino | The city north of Crosstown Parkway: master-planned St. Lucie West, wholly inside its own district, with Clover Park, and Torino between Interstate 95 and Florida's Turnpike, then St. Lucie North, Northport Village and Swan Park east of the Turnpike out to the North Fork of the St. Lucie River. |
| Oak Hammock and Palm Trails across to Bayshore Heights, Floresta Gardens and Riverview | Bayshore Heights, Floresta Gardens, Oak Hammock, Palm Trails, Riverview | The original platted grid between Crosstown Parkway and the C-24 canal, from Oak Hammock and Palm Trails by Interstate 95 across to Bayshore Heights, where City Hall is, Floresta Gardens and Riverview on the North Fork, with no community development district in any of the five. |
| Gatlin Pines and Rosser Reserve down to Becker Ridge, with Whispering Pines and Southbend Lakes | Becker Ridge, Gatlin Pines, Rosser Reserve, Southbend Lakes, Whispering Pines | The grid south of the C-24 canal toward Becker Road and the Martin County line: Gatlin Pines, Rosser Reserve, Whispering Pines and Becker Ridge, then Southbend Lakes past the Turnpike, where the Veranda and Tesoro districts are filling in land that was mostly empty in 2020. |
| Lyngate and Sandpiper Bay across the river and Sandhill Crossing past US 1 | Lyngate, Sandhill Crossing, Sandpiper Bay | The city across the North Fork: Lyngate and Sandpiper Bay, with the Botanical Gardens, between the river and US 1, and Sandhill Crossing past US 1, the largest guide, where the City's Community Redevelopment Area runs along the highway. |
| Tradition and Verano west of Interstate 95 | Tradition, Verano | The city west of Interstate 95: Tradition and Verano, master-planned communities almost entirely inside community development districts, counted at 2020's census and building fast since. |
Where the neighborhoods come from. Port St. Lucie draws its own neighborhoods. The City's Neighborhood Services department keeps a map of 36 named neighborhoods for its NICE program (Neighborhood Improvement and Community Engagement), and they never overlap: on our count of the 2020 census blocks they hold 204,318 of the city's 204,752 residents, 99.8%. Every guide is one of those neighborhoods as the City draws it, never two joined. Where the City splits a name, it names and serves the parts separately, so Floresta Gardens is not Floresta Pointe across Crosstown Parkway, and Bayshore Heights is not the Bayshore Business District. Each line is clipped to the city limits as St. Lucie County draws them today, which leaves out 395 residents of unincorporated blocks inside the City's Sandhill Crossing outline and 99 in St. Lucie North who were in the 2020 census city but are outside today's line. Where the City's other layers can be checked they agree: St. Lucie West's 13,163 residents are exactly the St. Lucie West community development district's. Several names are ones the program gave to General Development's numbered grid, Gatlin Pines, Rosser Reserve, Palm Trails, Becker Ridge and Sandhill Crossing among them, and whether residents use them was not checked, so those guides say the line is the City's map and name the roads, parks and schools inside. Each guide's population is the 2020 census count of the blocks inside it, and in Tradition and Verano that count is old: both have grown fast since. Only the City of Port St. Lucie is covered. Fort Pierce and St. Lucie Village are separate cities; River Park, White City and Indian River Estates are unincorporated St. Lucie County; Jensen Beach, Palm City and North River Shores are in Martin County; Hutchinson Island is across the lagoon; none of them is here. Neither are the 4,222 residents of the 18 unincorporated enclaves inside the city's outline, 3,803 of them in the Reserve, where PGA Golf Club is. And a Port St. Lucie mailing address is not proof of a City of Port St. Lucie address: the St. Lucie County Property Appraiser's record for the property is the one to read.
The five areas are ours. The City does publish divisions, and none of them is a way to choose where to live. Its four City Council districts, with the mayor elected citywide, are electoral and are redrawn as the city grows. Its mobility-fee assessment areas are drawn for road impact fees and put 189,844 of the city's 204,752 residents in one "East" area. Its Community Redevelopment Areas, along US 1 and in Southern Grove, held about 7,400 in 2020. Its NICE neighborhoods are real lines, and every guide uses one, but 36 are far too many to group by, and the planning-area numbers on the same map carry no names and put 78,532 residents, 38.4%, in one of them. So the five areas are set on the lines residents already divide the city by: Interstate 95, Florida's Turnpike, Crosstown Parkway, the C-24 canal, the North Fork of the St. Lucie River and US 1. By those lines, in 2020, St. Lucie West and the North held 56,202 residents, Central Port St. Lucie 40,300, South Port St. Lucie 62,261, the East Side 30,946 and Tradition and the West 15,043. Every guide falls at least 97% in one area except Riverview, which is 72% south of Crosstown Parkway and is in Central. "Southwest" is not used, because the City's Southwest assessment area is the land west of Interstate 95 while most residents mean the grid south of the C-24, so the word would point two ways. Which neighborhood lands in which area is our judgment.
What is not here. The first twenty guides held 157,528 of the city's 204,752 residents in 2020, 76.9%, and the rest of the City's neighborhoods come as the guides do. Floresta Pointe, 4,689 residents, is the first to add in the north; Cashmere Cove and Canal Pointe in the center; Hidden Oaks, Woodland Trails, Tulip Park and Crane Landing in the south; and Morningside, 947 residents with Morningside Elementary, on the East Side. In the west, the City's Riverland/Kennedy neighborhood held 787 residents on 3,849 acres in 2020 and is now one of the fastest-building parts of the city, so it is the first to add there, then Copper Creek and Fairgreen Crossings. Southern Grove has no neighborhood of its own on the City's map: it is inside Tradition's line, and so in that guide. LTC Ranch held 37 residents in 2020. The Bayshore Business District, 113 residents, is not residential enough for a guide. And some places are not where their names suggest: Oak Hammock K-8 is in Palm Trails, not Oak Hammock; Floresta Elementary is in Riverview, 112 meters outside Floresta Gardens; Legacy High School is in Verano, 323 meters outside Tradition; PGA Golf Club, whose name PGA Village Verano carries, is outside the city; and Savanna Club, 159 meters from Sandhill Crossing, is in the unincorporated county. The Sandpiper Bay resort was not found on any map we read, so no guide places it.