Port St. Lucie is a city in St. Lucie County, Florida, United States. It is the most populous municipality in the county with a population of 204,851 at the 2020 census. It is located 125 miles (201 km) southeast of Orlando and 113 miles (182 km) north of Miami. The Port St. Lucie Metropolitan Area includes the counties of St. Lucie and Martin and as of 2016 had an estimated population of 465,208. Port St. Lucie is also contained within the Miami-Fort Lauderdale-Port St. Lucie Combined Statistical Area with an estimated population of 6,832,588.

Demographics
- Languages
Sports
Education
Infrastructure
- Transportation
  - Bus
  - Expressways
  - Major roadways
  - Rail
Notable people
See also

Demographics

Historical population
Census	Pop.	%±
1970	330	—
1980	14,690	4,351.5%
1990	55,866	280.3%
2000	88,769	58.9%
2010	164,603	85.4%
2020	204,851	24.5%
U.S. Decennial Census

Port St. Lucie Demographics
2010 Census	Port St. Lucie	St. Lucie County	Florida
Total population	164,603	277,789	18,801,310
Population, percent change, 2000 to 2010	+85.4%	+44.2%	+17.6%
Population density	1,444.5/sq mi	485.7/sq mi	350.6/sq mi
White or Caucasian (including White Hispanic)	74.3%	71.8%	75.0%
(Non-Hispanic White or Caucasian)	61.6%	61.2%	57.9%
Black or African-American	16.3%	19.1%	16.0%
Hispanic or Latino (of any race)	18.4%	16.6%	22.5%
Asian	2.0%	1.6%	2.4%
Native American or Native Alaskan	0.4%	0.4%	0.4%
Pacific Islander or Native Hawaiian	0.1%	0.1%	0.1%
Two or more races (Multiracial)	3.0%	2.6%	2.5%
Some Other Race	3.9%	4.4%	3.6%

As of 2000, 31.6% of households had children under the age of 18 living with them, 61.8% were married couples living together, 10.0% had a female householder with no husband present, and 24.1% were non-families. Of all households 18.2% were made up of individuals, and 8.9% had someone living alone who was aged 65 or older. The average household size was 2.60 and the average family size was 2.94. As of the 2010 census the population was 61.6% non-Hispanic white, 15.6% non-Hispanic black, 0.8% Hispanic black, 0.4% Native American, 0.5% Asian Indian, 1.5% other Asian, 0.1% Pacific Island, 0.4% non-Hispanics reporting some other race alone, 3.0% from two or more races, and 17.6% non-black Hispanics.

In 2000, the city's population was spread out, with 24.3% under the age of 18, 5.9% from 18 to 24, 28.1% from 25 to 44, 22.8% from 45 to 64, and 18.8% who were 65 or older. The median age was 40 years. For every 100 females, there were 94.5 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 91.4 males.

In 2000, the median income for a household in the city was $40,509, and the median income for a family was $44,162. Males had a median income of $18,730 versus $16,702 for females. The per capita income for the city was $18,059. About 15.7% of families and 17.9% of the population were below the poverty line, including 11.1% of those under age 18 and 9.8% of those age 65 or over.

Languages

As of 2000, 88.05% of residents spoke English as their first language, while 6.59% spoke Spanish, 1.34% spoke Italian, 1.00% spoke French, 0.60% spoke German, and 0.50% spoke Haitian Creole as their mother tongue. In total, 11.94% of the total population spoke languages other than English.

Sports

Clover Park

PGA Village golf complex

Port St. Lucie is the spring training home to the New York Mets, as well as two minor league teams: the St. Lucie Mets, a Low-A team affiliated with the Low-A Southeast league, and the Florida Complex League Mets, a Rookie-level team affiliated with the Florida Complex League. All three play at Clover Park.

The PGA Village golf complex includes 54 holes of golf as well as a learning center and a historical center. The city also hosted the Ginn sur Mer Classic at Tesoro, the city's first ever PGA Tour event, in 2007.

The city has two soccer clubs, Mako Soccer Club and Port St. Lucie Soccer Club, that field both competitive and recreational teams at several age levels. The Treasure Coast Tritons soccer team also play in the city at the South County Stadium, starting in the 2019 season.

Port St. Lucie is the home of the 2009 & 2011 National Champions in Pop Warner football. In 2009, the Jr. Midget Pirates went 16–0 en route to winning the Pop Warner National Championship at Disney's Wide World of Sports Complex. In 2001, the Jr. Peewee Pirates went 17–0 in winning the National Championship.

Education

Port St. Lucie is served by St. Lucie County Public Schools, which is a school district which serves the rest of St. Lucie County.

Elementary schools

Bayshore Elementary
Floresta Elementary
Mariposa Elementary
Morningside Elementary
Rivers Edge Elementary
Village Green Environmental Studies School
Windmill Point Elementary

K–8 schools

Allapattah Flats
Manatee K–8
Northport K–8
Oak Hammock K–8
Palm Pointe Research School at Tradition
St. Lucie West K–8
West Gate K–8

K–12 schools

Christ Lutheran School

High schools

Port St. Lucie High School
St. Lucie West Centennial High School
Treasure Coast High School

Colleges and universities

Indian River State College
Keiser University
Fortis Institute

Charter schools

Palm Pointe Educational Research School at Tradition
Renaissance Charter School at Tradition
Renaissance Charter School of St. Lucie
Somerset Academy Bethany
Somerset Academy St. Lucie
Somerset College Preparatory Academy
Tradition Preparatory High School

Infrastructure

Transportation

Port St. Lucie is served by the St. Lucie Transportation Planning Organization (TPO). The TPO is a Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO), a federally mandated and federally funded transportation policy-making organization responsible for transportation planning, programming, and financing of State and Federal Transportation Funds for the City of Port St. Lucie. The TPO is governed by a TPO Board, which is composed of elected officials, representatives from the St. Lucie County School Board, and representatives from Community Transit, a division of The Council on Aging of St. Lucie, Inc.

Bus

The original bus system started out as a demand response service bus in the 1990s, it only served St. Lucie County. Soon it expanded to a fixed route system, going to predetermined locations along a route. On June 3, 2002, the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) approved funding, expanding the bus service to Martin County, and became the Treasure Coast Connector.

Expressways

Florida's Turnpike (State Road 91) is the only toll road in St. Lucie County, which is the northernmost place where the Turnpike and Interstate 95 run close to each other. The Turnpike has 2 exits within Port St. Lucie's city limits: Exit 142 (Port St. Lucie Boulevard (SR 716)) and exit 138 (Becker Road). For all of its route through Port St. Lucie, the Turnpike is east of I-95. The Turnpike is 4 lanes wide (2 in each direction), and provides access to Orlando to the north, and Miami to the southeast. The Port St. Lucie/Ft. Pierce Service Plaza is also located in Port St. Lucie.

Interstate 95 (State Road 9) is in the western portion of the city. It is 6 lanes wide (3 in each direction), and provides access to Jacksonville to the north, and Miami to the south. Exits within PSL's city limits are exit 126 (CR 712/Midway Road), exit 121 (St. Lucie West Blvd.), exit 120 (Crosstown Parkway), exit 118 (Gatlin Blvd./Tradition Pkwy.), and exit 114 (Becker Rd.).

Major roadways

Port St. Lucie is responsible for maintaining approximately 912.5 miles (1,468.5 km) of roadway within its city limits.

U.S. 1 (State Road 5) – Running the entire length of the state, its route through the city extends from the Martin/St. Lucie County line to the south to Midway Road at the northern limits of the city. This stretch of US 1 contains mostly strip malls and shopping centers. On the southeast corner of US 1's intersection with Walton Road/Veterans Memorial Blvd., is the MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Event Center, which was once envisioned as the center of the city's 'downtown'. As of today, the area around the Event Center remains mostly undeveloped.

Crosstown Parkway – Completed in October 2019, Crosstown Parkway is an east/west roadway connecting Interstate 95 (State Road 9) with U.S. 1 (State Road 5). Along with being a much-needed high-capacity third crossing of the North Fork of the St. Lucie River (Port St. Lucie Blvd. to the south, and Prima Vista Blvd. to the north being the other two), it is also the location of Florida's first superstreet intersection—also known as a "restricted-crossing U-turn intersection"—at Crosstown Parkway and Floresta Drive.

SR 716 – The state road portion of Port St. Lucie Boulevard (commonly shortened to PSL Blvd.) connects US 1 with Florida's Turnpike.

Prima Vista Boulevard/St. Lucie West Boulevard

Gatlin Boulevard/Tradition Parkway

Becker Road

Airoso Boulevard

Rail

The Florida East Coast Railway mainline passes through the extreme eastern parts of the city. FEC's K Branch passes through the northwestern part of the city. Both rail lines only pass through the city; no services are provided by the FEC inside Port St. Lucie's city limits.

Notable people

Rick Ankiel, professional baseball player
Mario Bencastro, Salvadorian novelist
Michael Brantley, professional baseball player
Donald De La Haye, professional football player and YouTube personality
Ace Hood, hip hop artist
Breanna Myles, beauty pageant titleholder
Gillian Robertson, UFC fighter
Larry Sanders (basketball), professional basketball player
Fabrizio Scaccia, professional football player
Din Thomas, UFC fighter
Albert Wilson (American football), professional football player
Mickey Wright, LPGA Hall of Fame

Port St. Lucie, Florida facts for kids

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