Court Opinion

ID: 9516839
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-06 23:53:45.675717+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:39:28.811807
License: Public Domain

Tom Glaze, Justice, dissenting. Arkansas law has been long settled that where there is a usage of a passageway over land, whether it began by permission or otherwise, if that usage continues openly for seven years after the landowner has actual knowledge that the usage is adverse to his interest or where the usage continues for seven years after the facts and circumstances of the prior usage are such that the landowner would be presumed to know the usage was adverse, then such usage ripens into an absolute right. (Emphasis added.) See Fullenwider v. Kitchens, 223 Ark. 442, 266 S.W.2d 281 (1954); see also Zunamon v. Jones, 271 Ark. 789, 610 S.W.2d 286 (Ark. App. 1981). Arkansas case law is also established that there is no authority for extending public prescription rights to a “parking area” or “landing” for the entry of boats into the Arkansas River. Id., Clarke v. Montgomery County, 268 Ark. 942, 597 S.W.2d 96 (Ark. App. 1980). The Zunamon court, citing the Clarke decision, recounted the rule that prescriptive easement rights are limited to public thoroughfares used for travel purposes, and there was no authority for extending rights to a parking area used sporadically by members of the public. Consistent with the Clarke holding, the Zunamon court ruled the evidence showed that an additional thirty-foot roadway was used by the public to gain access to the river. See also, Gazaway v. Pugh, 69 Ark. App. 297, 12 S.W.3d 662 (2000) (where hunters and fishermen sued landowner seeking both a public prescriptive easement and an injunction on the landowner from interfering with plaintiffs’ use of road). Until today’s decision, Arkansas law regarding public prescriptive rights has been applied only in cases where thoroughfares, roadways, or easements for travel purposes were in issue. None of the cases cited by the majority opinion involves a taking of an owner’s property for anything but a thoroughfare or roadway for travel purposes. The reason for failure to cite authority extending public prescriptive rights to such things as parking lots and turnarounds is best explained by the general rule relied on in the majority opinion that “prescriptive easements are not favored in the law, since they necessarily work corresponding losses or forfeitures in the rights of other persons.” See 25 Am. Jur. 2d Easements and Licenses § 45 (1996). While I concur with the majority decision to allow a prescriptive easement for ingress and egress to the river, I disagree with that part of its decision extending an easement beyond its traditional definition of a thoroughfare. The law of prescriptive easement has been unnecessarily expanded, and the Carsons have been burdened as a result of this court’s acquiescence to the taking of their property by Drew County for what has become essentially a public campground. Imber, J., joins this dissent.