I have done a LOT of work on hydrology/hydraulics/drainage of rural unpaved roads in the rugged coastal mountains of the PNW, which is basically a rainforest (just a colder one). Many of those roads were haphazardly constructed and needed fixing.

I can't read the language of the parent article so I can't comment on the likelihood of effects mentioned here being caused by road making.

However, I can say that it's quite common for local hydrology to be severely interrupted by poorly designed roads. Now... in terms of dewatering effects, that would typically be only very local in nature. The biggest issue is typically concentration of flows where they shouldn't be and tremendous sediment delivery to receiving water courses. This can happen in a large variety of ways: more frequent concentration of smaller events, large events, catastropic failure of drainage systems like small culverts or just blowout of the whole road prism, anthropogenic landslides, etc.

Sending extra water to places it doesn't belong will almost always lead to problems.