Hydro One Loses Prescriptive Easement Claim Over Private Access Road

• Published date: 06 April 2022
• Subject Matter: Litigation, Mediation & Arbitration, Real Estate and Construction, Trials & Appeals & Compensation, Real Estate
• Law Firm: Gardiner Roberts LLP
• Author: Mr James R.G. Cook

Easements that are intended to provide utility companies with access to maintain and service the utilities they provide are common features of many properties in Ontario. If the easement is not registered on title, however, the use of the easement lands must be established under the same legal requirements for an easement, and rights may be gained or lost in the same manner.

In Hydro One Networks Inc. v. Amos Allen Shiner, 2022 ONSC 1893 (CanLII), Hydro One Networks sought a declaration that it held a permanent easement over the portion of a road on the respondent's property in Cloyne, Ontario. Hydro One sought the right to use the road without permission in order to access an easement in favour of the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario, as well as ancillary orders that would permit access and prevent the respondent from preventing access to the road.

In the 1930s, Hydro One's predecessor company built a transmission line and towers that passed through the property now owned by the respondent. In 1948, an easement was granted to Hydro One's predecessor company on the land upon which the transmission towers were built. Hydro One employees must access the hydro easement to service and maintain the transmission towers and trim the vegetation around them.

To reach the hydro easement, Hydro One employees traditionally travelled over the portion of a road on land now owned by the respondent. There was no...