I was saying the other day about Mericans keeping their cats indoors.
One of my neighbours does this and I came home from ruggers training tonight and she's outside with her phone torch on looking in the bushes, I immediately said "lost your cat?" And then felt duty bound to help her find him, we managed to usher him home eventually.
If you just let your cat out normally you wouldn't ever have this problem because they're used to being out and don't get scared and you don't have to worry about them because they find their own way home when they please. You shouldn't have to worry about them being hit by cars either if you properly introduce them to the outside gradually and supervised and they will become more territorial and not just roam far and wide if you let them out as soon as they're old enough (my old neighbours did this and lost like 3 cats getting hit by cars while our cat never did because we started by supervising her in the back garden and now she very rarely even goes out the front at all