Rio, FL

Rio is an unincorporated Martin County community and census-designated place on the north side of the St. Lucie River, across from Stuart. Locally, the name is pronounced “Rye-oh.” The 2020 census counted 980 residents. Rio was platted as Rio St. Lucie, got a post office called Rio San Lucie in 1893, and eventually shortened to Rio. The river is the main geographic fact: Stuart is across the water, Jensen Beach sits to the northeast, and the little community is shaped by the same estuary as the larger towns around it.

Martin County has been working on a Rio community redevelopment area, with water, sewer, road, and town-center improvements aimed at giving the waterfront neighborhood a clearer center. That effort fits the place's current feel: older homes and small commercial stretches mixed with river-facing land and quick access to Stuart, Jensen Beach, and the coast. Rio's local scoop is a tiny river community whose name is easy to mispronounce, whose address sits in the Stuart orbit, and whose whole geography starts with the water.