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Seibu Railways is set to celebrate its 100th anniversary with a brand new limited-express train. As innovative and cool as the proposed design is, the concept art is rather unfortunate-looking…

Seibu Railways, the Saitama-based railway operator with lines running out of many of Tokyo’s busiest train stations, recently announced that it would be building a brand new rapid train for the first time in 25 years, with a scheduled roll out date for the new train set for 2018. The operator says it plans to unveil the machine as its new flagship train to celebrate the company’s approaching 100th anniversary.

Included in the announcement was a concept image of the design by renowned Japanese architect and designer Kazuyo Sejima. As the concept art shows, the train — as it’s currently planned, anyway — sports Sejima’s signature clean, swoopy, reflective retrofuturist look. Seibu says the idea is for the train to blend into the landscape, be it the towering skyscrapers of Tokyo proper or the sprawling hills and mountains of rural Japan, using a super reflective, mirror-like surface.

It’s early on yet, and Seibu is careful to point out the design could evolve. Still, we have to admit, we kind of like the design and can’t wait to see a train that looks like it screamed right out of the pre-apocalypse Fallout universe zipping through Tokyo; but for the fact that at a glance, the concept art, at least, kind of makes the proposed train resemble, a… well… how do we put this…?

Look, it looks a lot like a metallic dildo, all right? There, we said it.

Image: Seibu Railways

And in (fake) phallic train news:

Tokyo’s busiest train lines to get luxury “one-man” express pods by next April

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[ Read in Japanese ]