I Have an 06 RL i just got with XM free service. My traffic is not working. On a friends car i have seen the traffic but I dont know if I have to do something to activate it. I use the zoom into the traffic span of the zoom but I dont see the lines... Does it only work with a destination in or does it always show the traffic? What do I do>

 

Traffic and the XM radio are two separate services, so if you only have the XM part then the traffic will not work. You should call them and ask if you can get a free trial, if not, I believe the fee is somewhere around $7 a month.

 

if the traffic zoom span shows, then XM traffic is active
there's an option to turn traffic icons on/off, but I did not think that affected traffic flow

 

weird I cant find the area to turn traffic icons on and off

 

I think it is accessed from the "menu" button center console

 

Or the voice command, Display Traffic, assuming you are in an area that has traffic info, then after the system confirms Traffic icons are on, you can spin the knob and the map scale will indicate that Traffic info is available from about 1/2 mile to 10 or 20 miles.

 

I was driving home yesterday and wanted to verify my statement that icons on/off are accessed through menu button - which I found out they aren't.
But had very strange coincidence.
I Checked menu button and setup buttons - no path to icons, then remembered its accessed through the center knob.
Pushed center knob and icon option shows up, but my traffic icon is "greyed" out. Wierd, because right before I pressed it, traffic flow and icons were displayed on map.
I canceled out and sure enough, traffic was gone and zoom scale did not show "traffic available" scale. I went back to icon options and still could not access traffic.
I then did the voice command for traffic on - got feedback voice for turn traffic on, but nothing showed up on map. Tried voice command several more times, same result (nothing on map).
Stayed that way until I stopped at store. After restarting car, everything back to normal, i.e., traffic flow displayed on map.
Now I'm wondering if XM had a problem and it was just this coincidence that it happened the moment I went into the menus or is it a bug in the system for some sequence of menu selections. So, I tried reproducing through menus, but could not so I guess it was a wierd coincidence.