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Each quarter of an hour or so, an older diesel-powered train arrives at a spray-painted stop. Close by, a police siren pierces the almost continuous traffic drone. Commuters hurry past collapsing, ivy-draped fencing panels as rain clouds form.

It is perhaps the least likely spot you anticipate to find a perfectly formed vineyard. However James Bayliss-Smith has cultivated 40 mature vines sagging with plump purplish berries on a sprawling allotment situated between a line of 1930s houses and a commuter railway just above the city downtown.

"I've noticed people hiding illegal substances or other items in the shrubbery," states Bayliss-Smith. "Yet you just get on with it ... and keep tending to your vines."

Bayliss-Smith, 46, a documentary cameraman who also has a fermented beverage company, is not the only local vintner. He has pulled together a informal group of growers who produce wine from four discreet city grape gardens tucked away in back gardens and allotments throughout the city. It is sufficiently underground to have an official name yet, but the group's WhatsApp group is called Vineyard Dreams.

Urban Wine Gardens Around the World

So far, the grower's plot is the only one listed in the City Vineyard Network's forthcoming world atlas, which includes more famous city vineyards such as the eighteen hundred plants on the hillsides of Paris's historic artistic district neighbourhood and more than 3,000 vines with views of and inside the Italian city. Based in Italy non-profit association is at the forefront of a initiative re-establishing city vineyards in historic wine-producing countries, but has discovered them throughout the world, including urban centers in East Asia, South Asia and Central Asia.

"Vineyards help cities stay greener and more diverse. They preserve open space from development by establishing long-term, productive agricultural units inside urban environments," says the association's president.

Similar to other vintages, those created in urban areas are a result of the soils the plants thrive in, the unpredictability of the climate and the people who tend the grapes. "Each vintage embodies the charm, local spirit, environment and history of a city," notes the spokesperson.

Mystery Eastern European Variety

Back in Bristol, Bayliss-Smith is in a urgent timeline to harvest the vines he cultivated from a plant abandoned in his allotment by a Polish family. If the rain arrives, then the birds may seize their chance to attack again. "Here we have the enigmatic Eastern European grape," he says, as he cleans bruised and rotten grapes from the glistering bunches. "The variety remains uncertain their exact classification, but they're definitely disease-resistant. Unlike noble varieties – Burgundy grapes, Chardonnay and additional renowned French grapes – you don't have to treat them with chemicals ... this could be a special variety that was developed by the Soviets."

Group Efforts Throughout Bristol

The other members of the collective are additionally taking advantage of sunny interludes between bursts of fall precipitation. On the terrace with views of the city's shimmering harbour, where historic trading ships once bobbed with casks of wine from Europe and the Iberian peninsula, Katy Grant is harvesting her rondo grapes from approximately 50 plants. "I love the smell of these vines. It is so evocative," she remarks, stopping with a basket of grapes slung over her arm. "It recalls the fragrance of southern France when you roll down the vehicle windows on holiday."

Grant, fifty-two, who has devoted more than two decades working for humanitarian organizations in war-torn regions, unexpectedly inherited the grape garden when she returned to the United Kingdom from Kenya with her household in recent years. She felt an strong responsibility to maintain the vines in the yard of their recently acquired property. "This plot has previously endured multiple proprietors," she says. "I deeply appreciate the concept of natural stewardship – of passing this on to future caretakers so they can continue producing from this land."

Terraced Gardens and Traditional Winemaking

A short walk away, the final two members of the collective are busily laboring on the steep inclines of the local river valley. One filmmaker has cultivated over 150 plants situated on terraces in her wild half-acre garden, which tumbles down towards the muddy local waterway. "Visitors frequently express amazement," she says, indicating the tangled vineyard. "They can't believe they can see grapevine lines in a city street."

Currently, the filmmaker, 60, is harvesting clusters of deep violet Rondo grapes from rows of plants arranged along the cliff-side with the assistance of her daughter, her family member. The conservationist, a wildlife and conservation film-maker who has contributed to streaming service's Great National Parks series and BBC Two's Gardeners' World, was inspired to cultivate vines after observing her neighbour's grapevines. She's discovered that amateurs can make interesting, enjoyable natural wine, which can command prices of more than £7 a serving in the increasing quantity of wine bars specialising in low-processing vintages. "It is incredibly satisfying that you can actually create good, natural wine," she says. "It's very on trend, but really it's resurrecting an old way of making vintage."

"When I tread the grapes, the various wild yeasts come off the skins into the liquid," says the winemaker, ankle deep in a bucket of tiny stems, pips and red liquid. "That's how vintages were made traditionally, but industrial wineries introduce sulphur [dioxide] to kill the wild yeast and subsequently incorporate a commercially produced yeast."

Difficult Conditions and Creative Approaches

A few doors down active senior Bob Reeve, who inspired Scofield to plant her vines, has gathered his companions to pick white wine varieties from one hundred vines he has arranged precisely across two terraces. The former teacher, a northern English PE teacher who worked at the local university cultivated an interest in wine on regular visits to France. But it is a difficult task to cultivate this particular variety in the humidity of the gorge, with temperature fluctuations sweeping in and out from the Bristol Channel. "I aimed to make French-style vintages in this location, which is a bit bonkers," admits Reeve with a smile. "Chardonnay is slow-maturing and particularly vulnerable to mildew."

"My goal was creating Burgundian wines in this environment, which is a bit bonkers"

The unpredictable Bristol climate is not the only challenge encountered by grape cultivators. Reeve has had to erect a barrier on