Community safety · Minneapolis · data through September 2026

How safe is Central Minneapolis?

Central Minneapolis covers 6 neighborhoods in SafeRoute's Minneapolis index. Its median safety index is 23/100 — below the citywide median of 55, so more is reported around a typical neighborhood here than across Minneapolis. Downtown East scores highest at 34/100; Steven's Square - Loring Heights lowest at 20/100.

These figures describe reported crime around each neighborhood's center — they are informational, not a judgment of any community. 0 of 6 neighborhoods here rate low risk, 0 moderate, 2 elevated and 4 high risk.

Every neighborhood in Central, safest first

Neighborhood	Index	Band	Incidents
1 Downtown East	34/100	Elevated	673
2 North Loop	28/100	Elevated	883
3 Elliot Park	23/100	High risk	1,015
4 Loring Park	21/100	High risk	1,247
5 Downtown West	20/100	High risk	1,402
6 Steven's Square - Loring Heights	20/100	High risk	1,216

How Central compares across Minneapolis

Communities (safest first)	Median index	Neighborhoods
Southwest	82/100	9
Nokomis	73/100	11
Camden	63/100	9
Longfellow	57/100	5
Calhoun Isle	56/100	9
Northeast	55/100	13
University	51/100	7
Near North	43/100	6
Powderhorn	34/100	8
Phillips	28/100	4
Central (this page)	23/100	6

Common questions

What is the safest neighborhood in Central Minneapolis?

Downtown East has the highest SafeRoute safety index in Central Minneapolis, at 34/100 (elevated), from 673 reported incidents within 1 km of its center. North Loop (28/100) and Elliot Park (23/100) follow.

Which neighborhood in Central Minneapolis has the most reported crime?

Steven's Square - Loring Heights has the lowest index in Central Minneapolis, at 20/100, with 1,216 reported incidents within 1 km of its center. A low score means more is reported around that center, which busy commercial and transport areas produce simply by having more people in them — it is not a measure of how dangerous a resident's street is.

Is Central Minneapolis safe?

Across its 6 neighborhoods the median SafeRoute safety index is 23/100, against 55 across Minneapolis. 0 rate low risk, 0 moderate, 2 elevated and 4 high risk. These describe reported crime only and vary widely within the community — check the individual neighborhood rather than reading one number for the whole of it.

How is the SafeRoute safety index calculated?

SafeRoute weights each incident reported to the Minneapolis Police Department by severity (violence weighs more than shoplifting), sums the last available period within 1 km of the neighborhood center, and normalizes against citywide crime rates onto a 0–100 scale — higher is safer. It describes reported crime only; it is not a guarantee of safety. The figure shown for Central Minneapolis is the median of its 6 neighborhoods — the community is not measured separately.

Methodology

Each incident reported to the Minneapolis Police Department (via Minneapolis Open Data) is weighted by severity — violence counts for more than shoplifting. For every neighborhood we sum weighted incidents within 1 km of its center, and normalize against citywide rates onto a 0–100 index, higher = safer. Boundaries are the city's own 87 neighborhoods, grouped by its own 11 communities. Minneapolis wraps its neighborhoods around real lakes, so a centre that would otherwise land on open water is moved to the built-up part of the same neighborhood — never onto a neighbouring one. Time-of-day charts use MPD incident timestamps, severity-weighted. Pages regenerate as new data is published.

The index compares neighborhoods within Minneapolis. It is not comparable between cities: each police force publishes a different set of offences over a different period — Minneapolis's figures cannot be read against another city's on the same 0–100 scale.