Has anybody actually continued to subscribe to this service after the free trial period? I'm curious ot get feedback on the traffic service and if you actually find it to be accurate. For those that do subscribe, do you pay a monthly fee or can you pay a one-time lifetime fee?

 

It is accurate. Most major cities have the overhead hwy cams and road sensors. It runs off them and a satellite feed. I know here in Georgia, most of the interstates and state hwy's are covered through out the state. If you have a destination set in your NAV system and road gets jammed up, you'll automatically get a re-route. Plus it throws up an icon you can click for more detail on both traffic and weather. Weather has improved a lot over the last year.

I got lifetime XM back in September of '09 and a good deal on traffic/weather. They just bill me a few dollars quarterly, I think it's about $10 bucks a quarter. Can't afford not to have it at that price.

 

I continued the subscription for traffic too. The cost is minimal, maybe around $12 a quarter. It's helpful being 20 miles west of NYC. I skipped weather, it never really worked as I would have liked and provides little information. I got lifetime on XM for mid $300s. Prices went up but they can spread the payments over a few months. And I have renewed Safety Connect/Lexus Enform for the past two years. Not cheap but worth it to me.

 

On a recent 3 week trip to Florida, I must have received close to 50 traffic warnings via XM Traffic and not one of them was accurate!!! Quite frankly, now that I think about it, on all of my trips over the past two years, I have NEVER had a warning that was accurate. It costs about $12-14/quarter (including weather). I think the only reason I keep them is so that I get XM Stocks, which I use a lot.

I used the Lexus Enform a lot on the trip. Not only to load destinations from my home computer to the vehicle, but to call for routing when on the move. That proved to be very valuable.

 

I had the exact same experience with Traffic. Not accurate at all. In fact, on trips my wife and I would make good natured bets on whether the warnings would turn out to be accurate. Usually they weren't. We didn't renew.