The U.S. Census Bureau released a report earlier this month on population change in cities across the county, and the data might just have you spitting out your cafecito.
First and foremost, Jacksonville (the most populated city in the Sunshine State with 985,843 residents) surpassed Austin, Texas, to become the 10th largest city in the country. New York City kept the #1 spot with more than 8 million people–which is still almost 4.5 million more than the runner-up, Los Angeles.
If it surprises you that Jacksonville is in the top 10 and Miami’s not, it may be because the Census Bureau is only taking into account everyone who lives within the city limits. That was 455,924 people in 2023.
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Miami-Dade County, by comparison, was the seventh largest county in the U.S. with 2,686,867 residents in 2023.
Anyway, Jacksonville isn’t the only city that upped its population numbers in 2023.
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Port St. Lucie grew 5.7 percent from 2022 to 2023, the most of any Florida city by percentage. This represents a growth from 231,852 residents to 245,021 residents.
And Cape Coral, where 216,915 people lived in 2022, grew 3.5 percent to take the #7 spot away from Hialeah in the ranking of largest cities or towns in Florida.
Still, some of the data won’t come as much of a surprise. The Census Bureau says the three most populous cities in the Sunshine State are still Jacksonville, Miami and Tampa, in that order.
So the next time you’re stuck in traffic wishing you were anywhere else, just think, it could be worse. You could be in New York City. Or Jacksonville.
