The parent comment never used the phrase "right of way" so your comment does not contradict them, though to me it seems to have a tone of disagreement.
"It's now effectively impossible to not use private land to get around the area."
That implies public rights of way were removed. I fail to see any other interpretation of this. If there were never public rights of way then it was always impossible to get around the area.
Unless they mean they themselves live on one of these developments and must therefore traverse private land to get back on to a public highway. If so, ability to access the public highway is protected and living on such a development should always grant rights (and responsibilities) over use of the land (any decent solicitor would flag this up if not).
I think their meaning was something closer to your last paragraph - there was nothing interesting there before so it didn't matter that there was no public right of way.
But now there are things on private land that they are interested in. If you're thrown off a private road on your way to a pizza restaurant that's on it, you wouldn't have the same rights you're talking about for owners (or leaseholders) of properties on the private estate.
