The Government has spent £36,000 on new ice breakers following the severe weather "wake-up call" of 2010 which left hundreds stranded and cost a minister his job.
Police admitted that they "got it wrong" in November 2010 when arctic weather swept across Scotland.
Former transport minister Stewart Stevenson was forced to quit despite frequent apologies for "failing to communicate the position better and earlier". His replacement, Keith Brown, said it has taken time to get communications up to scratch but that they are ready for what lies ahead.
The Met Office warned that it is too early to say what the weather will hold over the "five to six month" winter period.
Unveiling the two new £18,000 ice breakers, Mr Brown said: "When I first got this job during the winter a couple of years ago I spent a night in the Transport Scotland control room.
"I was going back through to Edinburgh and I heard on the radio that there was a massive tailback with long delays, but I went straight through. So the idea now is to get accurate and timely information, which is not always easy to gather."
He said Transport Scotland was previously "so keen to make sure that the information was accurate that it was not always timely". Police said they still carry out a lot of analysis to make sure they don't "cry wolf".
Speaking on behalf of all of Scotland`s chief police officers, Assistant Chief Constable Allan Moffat said: "In November 2010 we got it wrong because we didn't get the message out quickly enough and the public suffered.
"We all know what happened on the major routes in Scotland. That was a bit of a wake-up call, certainly to us in the police, and we were more than happy to learn from that and get on the front foot. But we need to be careful not to cry wolf, so there's a lot of detailed analysis goes on before we tell people not to travel."
He said the move towards a single Scottish police force, with its integrated hi-tech control rooms, will improve communications in the future while retaining the local knowledge of the existing structure.
