In addition, JNR boasted that these train series 201, along with Special Rapid series 117, were no longer inferior to the trains of private railways running in parallel, and used them as a symbol of their counter attack on private railways to which JR/JNR had been mostly defensive.
それだけでなく、並行私鉄と比べても遜色のない車両であったことから、新快速の117系同様、防戦一方の国鉄のカウンターアタックのシンボルとなった。