Facts: A property owner accesses their property they use for private recreational purposes through a road that crosses property belonging to a neighbor. The property owner has used the road crossing the neighbor’s property to access their property continuously and openly for more than five years. The neighbor eventually blocks access to the road.
Claim: The property owner seeks to continue using the road, claiming they own a private prescriptive easement over the road for the purpose of accessing their property since they have used the road continuously and openly for more than five years, thus the neighbor has no right to block access to the road.
Counterclaim: The neighbor seeks to block access to the road claiming the adjoining property owner does not own a prescriptive easement through their property and, thus, has no right to use the road since the public’s use of private property for recreational purposes may not become a permanent right.
Holding: A California court of appeals holds the property owner established a private prescriptive easement since they used the road continuously and openly for more than five years to access their property and did not use the road for recreational purposes. [Pulido v. Pereira (2015) 234 CA4th 1246]
