Only a dozen people live in this Russian village at the end of the railroad - here's what their life is like

Maxim Zmeyev/Reuters

For many Russians living in remote communities, life couldn't exist without the railroad.

In the impossibly small village of Kalach in the Sverdlovsk Oblast, only a dozen or so residents call the forested town home and their numbers are dwindling.

Kalach is the terminus of the local narrow-gauge railway, the line literally stops there. The town used to house several hundred citizens, mostly in the forestry trade, at its peak during the height of the Soviet Union's power. But when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, with it tumbled the country's economy.

Now, life there is slow and uneventful as the village has become self-sustaining; trains only come a few times a week for supplies. Keep scrolling to see coverage from Reuters photographer Maxim Zmeyev, who captured how life continues in this minute village nestled in the thick forests of the Urals.