He put them on the map.
An ultra-rich Minnesota enclave named North Oaks is so secretive and exclusive that they have the distinction of being the only community not seen on Google Maps.
Or at least they did — until now.
An influencer went viral after using a drone to map the area, marking the end of a digital secrecy campaign that spanned decades.
“The mystery about North Oaks comes when you start learning about North Oaks,” digital content creator Chris Parr, who was born in the state, told the Daily Mail.
His viral footage, posted to YouTube, showed rows and rows of sprawling, multimillion-dollar homes, immaculately plowed roads, and no “trespassing signs” at every entrance.
North Oaks’ obscurity might come as a surprise, given that the Midwestern ivory tower is one of the nation’s wealthiest zip codes with dozens of palatial estates listed for upwards of $800,000 on homebuying platforms like Zillow. Last year, a five-bedroom, seven-bathroom home at 16 Evergreen Rd. was put on the market last year for nearly $3.5 million.
“There is a perception that a lot of executives, a lot of CEOs of Minnesota companies, live in North Oaks,” said Carr, noting that despite its reputation, “many Minnesotans don’t even know about [it].”
The residents keep their Elysium under wraps via various measures, including license plate readers and security cameras that monitor everyone entering or leaving the neighborhood. While not a gated community, developers legally moved every homeowner’s property line to encompass the streets, meaning that North Oaks is effectively devoid of public roads.
In 2008, the insular community proved even multinational tech titans weren’t exempt from their rules — North Oaks council threatened Google with a lawsuit after discovering that their neighborhood was visible via Street View, a function that shows what properties look like from the ground level, the CBC reported. In an angry letter, they threatened to cite the company for trespassing if it didn’t scrap the images and wipe the data.
The search engine capitulated in a move Google rep Elaine Filadelfo billed as likely the first instance of a US city demanding to be removed from the digital grid.
“This is very rare where an entire town would request to be taken off,” Filadelfo said.
Despite North Oaks legal victory, Carr managed to find a loophole in that the town didn’t own the airspace. He was allowed to fly his aerial recon bot over the snowy El Dorado as long as it remained within his sight line and provided he had approval from the Federal Aviation Administration.
As the influencer noted in the clip’s caption, “North Oaks didn’t ban mapping.. only trespassing.”
After completing the course to become an official drone operator, the digital cartographer embarked on his mission to disable North Oaks’ online cloaking device.
To avoid having to bypass the abundant license plate readers and surveillance cams, he uploaded a Craigslist advert requesting an invite from a North Oaks resident. A woman using the handle Maggie Smith agreed to permit him entry into the West Rec Park for $10.
From there, the Minneapolis resident was able to capture the aforementioned footage of the houses and achieve his mission of mapping out all North Oaks streets, which he noted are technically private property.
In doing so, he “finished Google Maps, once and for all,” Carr quipped in the video caption.
North Oaks residents weren’t happy that their cover was blown with North Oaks Homeowner’s Association (NOAHA) president Andrew Hawkins reportedly mulling taking legal action against the interloper.
However, the Minnesotan said there was an important method to his map-nesss, declaring to the Daily Mail, “Maps are a piece of public infrastructure. To have an incomplete map is a disservice to humanity.”
Many YouTube commenters were on board with his mission to bring the hoity-toity hamlet to light.
“My grandpa lives in a retirement community in the upper tippy top corner of North Oaks,” said one. “He’d find this whole concept absolutely hilarious. Perhaps he could invite you in, make a plan, and then you could explore the rest of it?”
“Perfect example of the Streisand Effect,” wrote another, describing the phenomenon of how attempts to suppress information paradoxically have the opposite effect.
However, a third claimed that by showing the video, the Midwesterner had inadvertently “doxxed” himself.
In retrospect, Carr explained that he does “think privacy is important” and that private citizens’ rights need to be respected.
However, the YouTuber told the Daily Mail that he saw the “value [in] being able to explore without leaving your house.
“I think that’s fascinating that we’re able to see a view from the street almost anywhere in the country and around the world,” he declared.
Coincidentally, Carr’s Google Images were surreptitiously removed a week after he uploaded them, prompting him to post more in response.
