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Each 20 minutes or so, an older diesel railway carriage pulls into a spray-painted station. Close by, a law enforcement alarm pierces the near-constant road noise. Commuters hurry past collapsing, ivy-draped fencing panels as storm clouds form.

This is perhaps the last place you anticipate to find a perfectly formed grape-growing plot. But James Bayliss-Smith has cultivated four dozen established plants sagging with round purplish grapes on a sprawling garden plot situated between a row of 1930s houses and a commuter railway just above Bristol downtown.

"I've seen individuals hiding illegal substances or whatever in those bushes," states Bayliss-Smith. "But you just get on with it ... and keep tending to your grapevines."

Bayliss-Smith, forty-six, a filmmaker who also has a kombucha drinks business, is not the only urban winemaker. He has pulled together a informal group of growers who make vintage from several discreet urban vineyards nestled in private yards and allotments across Bristol. The project is too clandestine to possess an official name so far, but the group's messaging chat is called Grape Expectations.

City Vineyards Across the World

To date, the grower's plot is the only one listed in the City Vineyard Network's forthcoming global directory, which includes more famous city vineyards such as the 1,800 plants on the slopes of Paris's historic Montmartre area and more than 3,000 grapevines overlooking and inside the Italian city. The Italian-based charitable organization is at the forefront of a movement reviving urban grape cultivation in historic wine-producing countries, but has identified them throughout the world, including cities in Japan, Bangladesh and Uzbekistan.

"Vineyards help urban areas remain greener and ecologically varied. They preserve land from construction by establishing permanent, productive farming plots within cities," explains the association's president.

Like all wines, those produced in cities are a product of the earth the plants thrive in, the unpredictability of the weather and the people who tend the grapes. "Each vintage represents the beauty, community, environment and history of a city," notes the president.

Mystery Eastern European Variety

Returning to the city, Bayliss-Smith is in a race against time to harvest the grapevines he cultivated from a cutting abandoned in his allotment by a Polish family. Should the precipitation comes, then the pigeons may seize their chance to attack again. "This is the mystery Polish variety," he says, as he cleans damaged and mouldy berries from the shimmering bunches. "The variety remains uncertain what variety they are, but they're definitely disease-resistant. In contrast to noble varieties – Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and additional renowned French grapes – you need not spray them with chemicals ... this is possibly a unique cultivar that was developed by the Soviets."

Collective Efforts Across Bristol

Additional participants of the collective are also taking advantage of bright periods between showers of fall precipitation. On the terrace overlooking Bristol's shimmering harbour, where historic trading ships once floated with barrels of wine from France and the Iberian peninsula, one cultivator is harvesting her rondo grapes from about 50 vines. "I love the aroma of these vines. It is so reminiscent," she remarks, stopping with a basket of grapes resting on her arm. "It's the scent of southern France when you open the car windows on vacation."

The humanitarian worker, 52, who has spent over 20 years working for charitable groups in war-torn regions, unexpectedly inherited the vineyard when she returned to the UK from Kenya with her household in recent years. She experienced an strong responsibility to look after the vines in the yard of their new home. "This plot has already survived three different owners," she explains. "I deeply appreciate the concept of environmental care – of handing this down to future caretakers so they keep cultivating from the soil."

Sloping Gardens and Traditional Production

A short walk away, the final two members of the collective are hard at work on the steep inclines of Avon Gorge. Jo Scofield has cultivated over one hundred fifty plants perched on terraces in her wild half-acre garden, which descends towards the silty local waterway. "People are always surprised," she notes, indicating the interwoven vineyard. "They can't believe they can see rows of vines in a urban neighborhood."

Today, the filmmaker, sixty, is picking bunches of dusty purple Rondo grapes from lines of vines slung across the cliff-side with the assistance of her child, her family member. The conservationist, a wildlife and conservation film-maker who has contributed to Netflix's Great National Parks series and television network's gardening shows, was motivated to plant grapes after observing her neighbour's grapevines. She has learned that amateurs can produce intriguing, pleasurable natural wine, which can command prices of more than seven pounds a glass in the increasing quantity of establishments specialising in low-processing wines. "It is incredibly satisfying that you can actually make good, traditional vintage," she says. "It's very fashionable, but really it's resurrecting an old way of making vintage."

"When I tread the fruit, the various natural microorganisms are released from the skins and enter the liquid," says the winemaker, partially submerged in a container of tiny stems, pips and red liquid. "This represents how wines were historically produced, but commercial producers add sulphur [dioxide] to kill the natural cultures and then add a commercially produced yeast."

Challenging Environments and Creative Solutions

A few doors down sprightly retiree another cultivator, who inspired Scofield to establish her grapevines, has assembled his companions to pick Chardonnay grapes from one hundred vines he has laid out neatly across two terraces. The former teacher, a Lancashire-born physical education instructor who worked at Bristol University developed a passion for viticulture on regular visits to France. However it is a difficult task to cultivate Chardonnay grapes in the dampness of the valley, with temperature fluctuations moving through from the nearby estuary. "I wanted to produce French-style vintages in this location, which is a bit bonkers," says Reeve with a smile. "Chardonnay is slow-maturing and very sensitive to fungal infections."

"I wanted to make European-style vintages here, which is rather ambitious"

The unpredictable local weather is not the sole challenge faced by grape cultivators. The gardener has had to install a fence on