The daily pita pilgrimage begins at 7:30 p.m., when New Yorkers — and a handful of in-the-know tourists — begin lining up at the corner of 53rd Street and Sixth Avenue. Within minutes, the line emanating from the fragrant gyro stand there stretches halfway down the block.

Two other gyro carts within a half-block radius have no wait at all. But city foodies contend that Halal Gyro and Chicken is worth waiting on a line that can exceed 45 minutes on some evenings. The stand’s $5 platter includes chicken, lamb, rice, salad, pita, and, most importantly, customers say, a tasty combination of white and red sauces.

“You don’t understand — it has so much flavor,” a junior at City College of New York, Ralph Mangual, said of the sauce combo. Mr. Mangual, 20, who has been frequenting this stand since high school, waited 25 minutes for a gyro plate on a recent Tuesday night.

In New York, a city of seemingly limitless choices, inhabited by famously fast-paced people, there are still some things for which residents are willing to wait in line. What’s worth the idle time? For some it’s a bargain; for others it’s a status symbol. For some, it’s a gyro platter; for others it’s a pair of sneakers, a basket of Buffalo wings, a museum exhibit, a stuffed toy, a cupcake, or two tickets to “Shakespeare in the Park.”

The heightened anticipation for what’s deemed worth waiting for can enhance the mind’s perception of those cart-cooked gyros, saucy chicken wings or buttercream-frosted cupcakes, a New York-based clinical psychologist, Robert Leahy, said, referring to a phenomenon known as the “Halo Effect.” “Today people are very insecure about getting the right thing, and the easiest way to make a decision is to seek out what everyone else is buying,” Mr. Leahy, who heads up the American Institute for Cognitive Therapy on East 57th Street, said. “If they didn’t feel like they had to fit in, and they just looked at what they value, they might make different decisions.”

On the flip side, in this bigger-better-deal city, a store, a restaurant, a piece of merchandise can become unpopular as quickly as it became a must go, must try, or must buy, Mr. Leahy said. “When a once-crowded restaurant or theater becomes less crowded, people can dramatically change their mind about it,” he said. “They’ll say, ‘It must be going out of business,’ or ‘It must be a lousy place,’ It’s like a stampede.”

At Momofuku — a 30-seat East Village noodle bar — a Park Slope resident, Peter Madden, and a friend waited for about a half-hour before they were seated.

“You see people waiting in line, and you figure it must be good — even if the people waiting only jumped in line because that’s what others were doing,” Mr. Madden, 32, said. “It’s part of the herd mentality.”

Mr. Madden said he was willing to queue up outside Momofuku if it meant a bowl of Japanese ramen with pork slabs. “New Yorkers are oddly patient when it comes to food,” he said. “Maybe it’s because there are so many options that you can say, ‘I want southeast Indian food tonight.'”

It’s not just meals or desserts that has New Yorkers joining time-devouring lines. Each morning, parents from across the city line up in Midtown for $15 “Starbury” basketball sneakers, available exclusively at Steve & Barry’s sportswear stores. Since New York City has just one Steve & Barry’s retail location, the line for the shoes, endorsed by Stephon Marbury of the New York Knicks, can span the length of Herald Square’s Manhattan Mall.

There’s a tendency attribute the long lines to America’s consumer culture and an obsession with status symbols, a City University of New York sociologist, William Kornblum, said. “But the major motivation for waiting on line is to do something nice for someone else,” he said, “to take a friend or a lover to a restaurant, and — even more — to do something special for their children.”

Or for the sake of high art, Mr. Kornblum added.”New Yorkers are also one of the only urban populations that will stand on line for museum exhibits,” he said. “They want to be able to say they’ve seen it, but more importantly, they actually want to see the work.”

During the Neue Galerie’s recently closed Gustav Klimt exhibit, the wait often exceeded an hour, according to the museum’s executive director, Scott Gutterman. Maximum capacity at the East 86th Street museum is 350, and the lines snaked around the block.

Some New York venues are as well known for their lengthy lines as they are for their in-demand merchandise. New Yorkers with a hankering for a plate of cheese fries and a black-and-white milkshake from the ever-crowded Shake Shack can track line lengths via a realtime Web Cam. “Plan your time, check out the line!” the Web site suggests.

Meanwhile, many weekend sweet-seekers know well that they’ll have to brave an out-the-door-and-around-the-corner line if they’re serious about buying a $1.75 cupcake from Magnolia Bakery in the West Village. Adding to the allure is the perceived rarity of Magnolia baked goods. Unless customers call ahead, they can purchase no more than a dozen cupcakes a visit.

An owner of Halal Gyro and Chicken, Mohammed Aboualenein, 47, said he and his three business partners — all of the men are immigrants from Egypt — have no intention of opening additional “branches.” It’s too much work, he said, and it’s hard to find good help.

“People come by, and they say, ‘Why the line?’ Mr. Aboulenein, who has been serving up gyro platters at his current location since he mid-1990s, said. “We say, ‘Taste the food.'” He wouldn’t divulge the secret of the sauce combination by which so many New Yorkers swear.

Some entrepreneurs purposefully keep their businesses small and their stores few in number or limited in stock to create a frenzy around their merchandise, the editor of Brandweek, Karen Benezra, said. “This is one of those masterful pieces of marketing,” she said. “If you get it right, you feel like the world is coming to your door. Magnolia is a good example. If you get it wrong, you feel really stupid. People like to line up for things they find are exclusive or special.”

Ms. Benezra added, “The idea is to create a sense of exclusivity. They try to get the world to clamor for more. Does that turn people off? Occasionally. But is it worth risking to build some buzz? More often than not.”

Despite the press coverage generated when baseball fans camp out at Shea Stadium to score playoff tickets, the Mets — for the first time this year — moved its line online. Post-season tickets have been available exclusively via an Internet lottery.

Lines, depending on where they lead, can either entice or deter, according to one East Village resident. Christian Sempere, 25, who works in the financial services industry, said lines for ten-cent each Buffalo wings at Croxley’s Ales on Avenue B, or butter cream-frosted cupcakes at Magnolia don’t bother him, but he refuses to queue up at a department store. “There’s a big difference between clothes and cupcakes,” Mr. Sempere, 25, said while he waited his turn for a Magnolia cupcake on a recent Saturday night. “When it comes to cupcakes, we’re talking immediate satisfaction.” Immediate, that is, just as soon as he gets to the front of the line.

Where To Wait

Remember to bring an iPod or some reading material to pass the time waiting to get into the following New York venues (wait times as reported by the institutions).

HALAL GYRO AND CHICKEN
Sixth Avenue at 53rd Street

Waiting for: A hefty platter of meat, rice, salad and secret sauce combination.
Peak time: 8:30 to 9:30 p.m., and midnight to 3 a.m., Fridays and Saturdays
Average wait time: 45 minutes

CROXLEY’S ALES
28 Avenue B

Waiting for: $0.10 Buffalo wings on Mondays and Wednesdays.
Peak time: 6 p.m. to 10 p.m.
Average wait time: 45 minutes

MOMOFUKU NOODLE BAR
163 First Ave.

Waiting for: Ramen noodles and crispy pig tail
Peak time: Thursday, 8 p.m.
Average wait time: Half-hour to 45 minutes

SWAY
305 Spring St.

Smiths/Morrissey Sundays with Ben Cho and Brian DeGraw spinning at this nightclub and lounge.
Peak times: 12:30 a.m. to 2:30 a.m.
Average wait time: Half-hour

SARABETH’S
423 Amsterdam Ave.

Waiting for a table for brunch.
Peak times: Weekends, 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Average wait time: Half-hour to 45 minutes