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Each 20 minutes or so, an older diesel train pulls into a spray-painted station. Close by, a police siren cuts through the almost continuous road noise. Daily travelers rush by falling apart, ivy-draped fencing panels as rain clouds gather.

This is perhaps the least likely spot you expect to find a perfectly formed vineyard. However one local grower has managed to 40 mature vines heavy with plump mauve grapes on a sprawling allotment situated between a row of 1930s houses and a local rail line just north of the city downtown.

"I've seen people concealing illegal substances or other items in the shrubbery," states Bayliss-Smith. "But you just get on with it ... and continue caring for your grapevines."

The cameraman, 46, a documentary cameraman who runs a fermented beverage company, is not the only local vintner. He's pulled together a informal group of growers who make vintage from several hidden urban vineyards tucked away in back gardens and community plots across the city. It is sufficiently underground to have an formal title yet, but the collective's messaging chat is named Vineyard Dreams.

Urban Wine Gardens Around the World

So far, the grower's plot is the sole location registered in the Urban Vineyards Association's forthcoming world atlas, which features better-known city vineyards such as the 1,800 plants on the slopes of the French capital's historic Montmartre neighbourhood and over 3,000 vines overlooking and inside Turin. Based in Italy charitable organization is at the vanguard of a initiative reviving urban grape cultivation in historic wine-producing countries, but has identified them all over the globe, including urban centers in Japan, South Asia and Uzbekistan.

"Vineyards help cities remain greener and more diverse. These spaces protect land from construction by creating long-term, yielding farming plots within cities," says the association's president.

Like all wines, those created in cities are a result of the soils the vines thrive in, the unpredictability of the weather and the people who care for the fruit. "Each vintage represents the charm, community, landscape and history of a city," adds the president.

Unknown Eastern European Variety

Returning to Bristol, Bayliss-Smith is in a urgent timeline to gather the vines he cultivated from a cutting left in his garden by a Polish family. If the rain arrives, then the pigeons may seize their chance to feast again. "This is the mystery Eastern European grape," he comments, as he removes damaged and rotten berries from the glistering clusters. "We don't really know what variety they are, but they are certainly hardy. In contrast to noble varieties – Pinot Noir, white wine grapes and other famous French grapes – you don't have to treat them with chemicals ... this could be a unique cultivar that was developed by the Soviets."

Collective Efforts Across Bristol

Additional participants of the group are also taking advantage of sunny interludes between bursts of fall precipitation. On the terrace overlooking the city's shimmering harbour, where medieval merchant vessels once floated with casks of wine from Europe and Spain, Katy Grant is collecting her dark berries from about 50 vines. "I adore the aroma of these vines. It is so evocative," she remarks, pausing with a basket of fruit resting on her arm. "It recalls the fragrance of southern France when you roll down the car windows on holiday."

Grant, 52, who has spent over 20 years working for charitable groups in conflict zones, inadvertently took over the grape garden when she returned to the UK from East Africa with her household in recent years. She felt an strong responsibility to look after the grapevines in the yard of their new home. "This vineyard has already survived three different owners," she explains. "I deeply appreciate the idea of environmental care – of handing this down to future caretakers so they keep cultivating from this land."

Terraced Gardens and Natural Production

Nearby, the final two members of the collective are hard at work on the precipitous slopes of the local river valley. Jo Scofield has cultivated over 150 plants situated on ledges in her wild half-acre garden, which descends towards the silty local waterway. "People are always surprised," she notes, gesturing towards the tangled grape garden. "It's astonishing to them they can see rows of vines in a city street."

Today, the filmmaker, 60, is harvesting clusters of dusty purple dark berries from lines of plants arranged along the hillside with the assistance of her child, Luca. The conservationist, a wildlife and conservation film-maker who has contributed to Netflix's nature programming and television network's Gardeners' World, was inspired to cultivate vines after observing her neighbor's grapevines. She has learned that hobbyists can produce intriguing, pleasurable natural wine, which can command prices of more than seven pounds a serving in the growing number of establishments focusing on minimal-intervention wines. "It's just deeply rewarding that you can truly create good, natural wine," she states. "It's very on trend, but really it's resurrecting an old way of producing vintage."

"When I tread the fruit, the various wild yeasts come off the surfaces into the liquid," says the winemaker, partially submerged in a bucket of tiny stems, seeds and crimson juice. "That's how vintages were historically produced, but industrial wineries introduce preservatives to kill the natural cultures and subsequently add a commercially produced culture."

Challenging Conditions and Creative Approaches

In the immediate vicinity sprightly retiree Bob Reeve, who motivated his neighbor to establish her vines, has assembled his friends to pick white wine varieties from the 100 plants he has laid out neatly across two terraces. The former teacher, a northern English PE teacher who worked at the local university cultivated an interest in wine on annual sporting trips to France. But it is a challenge to grow this particular variety in the humidity of the gorge, with temperature fluctuations sweeping in and out from the nearby estuary. "I wanted to make Burgundian wines in this location, which is somewhat ambitious," admits Reeve with a smile. "This variety is late to ripen and very sensitive to mildew."

"I wanted to make European-style vintages in this environment, which is a bit bonkers"

The unpredictable Bristol climate is not the sole challenge encountered by winegrowers. Reeve has had to erect a barrier on