The burdened parcel is called the "servient estate" and the benefited parcel the "dominant estate".
After 1419, when the various political elements combined to form a common legislative diet, the Knights and their vassals emerged as the dominant estate.
Unless the parties intended to create more expansive rights, an appurtenant easement cannot be used to benefit property other than the dominant estate, and the identity and maximum size of the dominant estate are fixed at the time the easement is created.
Here, the owner of the driveway is considered to have the servient estate whereas the easement-holder is considered to have the dominant estate.
The deed should go so far as to speak in terms of the specific maintenance obligations of each neighbor by explaining if the dominant estate-holder's rights are just to use the easement as a passageway, or, instead, if the dominant estate-holder can maintain the easement with such things as plantings, fencing, paving, etc.
The dominant estate has rights that exist on top of that of the property owner who must, in turn, moderate his own rights for the purpose of serving the dominant's intended use.
As a result, maintenance and snow removal would typically fall on the shoulders of the easement-holder (a.k.a dominant estate), by default, who has a corresponding duty to keep the easement in sufficiently good repair so as to avoid harm to the servient landowner's property.
More particularly, the deed should unequivocally state if the servient landowner is completely excluded from use of the driveway existing for the benefit of the easement-holder, or if both the servient and the dominant estate can use the driveway in a shared manner.
If you are the dominant estate holder, you can terminate an easement through abandonment.
Also, in the event there are multiple dominant estate holders (e.g., a parcel of land is owned by three separate individuals), every dominant estate holder must agree to the release.
