Pike v. Wyllie

If the majority is correct, even a landowner whose only means of access to his landlocked property runs along an easement covered by quicksand is not entitled to a way of necessity. I dissent, because the majority’s unnecessarily narrow construction of ways of necessity law works in this case to defeat the basic purpose of the statute.

According to the majority, the existence of any enforceable access, even if it is unusable, bars an owner of landlocked land from obtaining a way of necessity. That must be true, it contends, because (1) the legislature sought to eliminate mere convenience as a…