In 2017 an network of new hard surface rides was constructed, without an environmental impact assessment, involving the dumping of huge quantities of hard core, builders rubble and chalk rubble on the main circuit of forestry rides (see Bangs 2018). This was done in contravention of the legal requirement for planning permission. When enforcement action was taken by Mid Sussex District Council it was ignored.
Some of those now-destroyed rides followed the course of ancient trackways and are likely to have had very rich plant assemblages.
Since then the rest of the semi-natural rides system has been little used by forestry traffic and has not been maintained. Fallen trees and woody debris are not readily cleared, and necessary mowing and brashing have not been done. When heavy forest harvesting machinery is used on the semi-natural rides it cuts so deep that it is likely that sustaining mycorrhizal networks that cross the rides are severed.