This afternoon I went for a ride on local Bsildon Moor.

In quite a lot of areas drainage ditches have been dug to drain water off the main tracks. Your not talking quality narrow drainage channels that are faced with stone, but foot wide dug trenches.

I thought the latest advice was to try and reduce the runoff from upland areas, not encourage it?

It is also pretty dangerous not knowing they are there!

Is it still considered best practice?

Arguably, rain runoff from a compacted path to uncompacted moor reduces the speed of run off, since it has more opportunity to soak into the ground instead of run off the hill straight away.

Generally, engineering drainage is avoided where possible in wild areas.