Japan Puts New Spin on Swivel Seats

General Motors‘ introduction of swivel seats in 1973 made people’s heads turn, but these Japanese subway cars put a much cooler spin on the idea.

As you can see in the video below, the seats turn 180° — effectively transforming the trains front to its back.

Jalopnik explains:

In case it’s not clear from the video above, when this train in Japan pulls into the terminal for its last stop on the run, instead of turning the train around, or having all the seats face backwards, or having some seats face backwards and some seats face forwards like the Manichean delusion that is the American method of rail travel, the seats themselves all switch. [read more]

I don’t know about you, but never having to drive in reverse sounds pretty cool to me. Too bad cars missed the train on this invention. The advent of autonomous cars makes the front and rear of automobiles pretty much irrelevant.

Still, it’s only a matter of time before shops that do a lot of transit upholstery repairs see seats like this.