Opinion ID: 2010267
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: Legal Principles Regarding Prescriptive Easements

Text: In considering Lake Arrowhead's assignments of error challenging the district court's conclusion that Jolliffe was entitled to a prescriptive easement, we are guided by certain principles. We have noted that `[t]he use and enjoyment which will give title by prescription to an easement is substantially the same in quality and characteristics as the adverse possession which will give title to real estate....' Harders v. Odvody, 261 Neb. 887, 894, 626 N.W.2d 568, 574 (2001) (quoting Svoboda v. Johnson, 204 Neb. 57, 281 N.W.2d 892 (1979)). A party claiming a prescriptive easement must show that his or her use was exclusive, adverse, under a claim of right, continuous and uninterrupted, and open and notorious for the full 10-year prescriptive period. Simacek v. York County Rural P.P. Dist., 220 Neb. 484, 370 N.W.2d 709 (1985). The law treats a claim of prescriptive right with disfavor, and, accordingly, such a claim requires that all the elements of such adverse use be clearly, convincingly, and satisfactorily established. Id.; Svoboda, supra . As for the element of adversity, this court has recognized that a permissive use is not adverse and cannot ripen into an easement. Simacek, supra .