A motor vehicle navigation system comprises a position sensor that senses the geographical position of the navigation system and provides a first navigation system position signal indicative thereof. The navigation system system also includes a navigation computing unit that recieves the first navigation system position signal and transmits onto a data bus (i) a first position signal indicative of the position of a trip starting location, (ii) a second position signal indicative of a trip destination location and (iii) the first navigation system position signal. A road map memory device includes map data. A second computing unit recieves (i) the first position signal, (ii) the second position signal and (iii) the first navigaion system position signal and the map data, and generates initial image data including map data indicative of the trip starting location, the trip destination location and the current position of the navigation system, and a display displays an initial image indicative of the initial image data.