Aggregates (sand, gravel) are what makes our roads and cities possible, but getting those aggregates means ripping up the landscape. In the old days, the companies could remove the soil, dig out the aggregates, and abandon the site, leaving a nasty scar on the landscape. Nowadays they're required to "restore" their sites. This creates a slightly less nasty landscape, but also a rather strange looking one from an ecological perspective. You really need to be very unfamiliar with what the landscape would have looked like before being mined to be able to accept that the "restored" landscape is anything like what was there before.