In a cellphone parking lot on the fringe of Kennedy Airport, nearly every spot is taken, with drivers waiting to hear from the internet about being hired. A man on a prayer rug makes his devotions. As the summer day comes toward its end, the air stirs and shifts on an evening breeze.

A cleaning rag in his hand, Parvinder Singh, 23, stops polishing the side mirror on his Uber car.

“You smell that?” he asks. “Every time, when the wind blows!”

An Uber driver in the next parking spot, Parvinder’s cousin Ronnie Singh, moves the narrative along.

“People pee behind the car,” Mr. Singh, 25, said.

Well, some people.

“The men have that option,” said another driver, Michele Dottin, 54. “As a female, we don’t have that option.”