I suggest some of this is down to noise abatement proceedures, which specify seriously wide flying at quite a few places.
Some airfields with NIMBY problems have published downwinds starting/finishing almost 3mi from the runway! Unfortunately these proceedures are often published in flight guides and on the Internet without any form of scale attached, apart from the amorphous globs that are the NIMBY's to be avoided. All pretty meaningless to a visitor unfortunately.
I don't know if the omission of scale stems from a reluctance to admit that some of the proceedures potentially place circuits outside the ATZ.