played host to the Cavan International Drama Festival, a competition which has always drawn the finest in amateur drama. After the abolition of Cavan Town Council left the building empty in 2014, the building reopened in 2015 as the local arts centre, under the name 'Townhall Cavan'. Transport Road The town is located on the junction of two national routes, the N3 to Dublin and N55 to Athlone. The National Development Plan provides for a major upgrading of the route with an M3 motorway from Kells to Dublin (completed and officially opened on 4 June 2010) and type 2 dual carriageway from Whitegate on the Meath border to Cavan, which will eventually bypass Virginia too. The N3 and N55 eastern bypass around Cavan town was fully completed in March 2006, eliminating the need for heavy traffic to pass through an already congested town. Railway Although Cavan has no railway links today, there were once two railway stations on separate lines, linking the Great Northern Railway (GNR) and Midland Great Western Railway, then an end junction of the Belfast-Cavan route linking Clones with a branch line to Crossdoney and Killeshandra. With the Cavan-Dublin route, via Inny Junction, Longford and Mullingar on the Dublin-Sligo railway line. There is an old railway line running through Kingscourt on the border of County Meath; this line is now overgrown. A branch of the Cavan and Leitrim Railway was also indirectly linked to Cavan town via Belturbet (the C&L terminus) and Ballyhaise on the GNR line. When the Government of Northern Ireland closed the section of the Belfast line from Portadown to Glaslough in 1957, it was found to be uneconomical to keep running the rump section from Monaghan to Cavan. All these lines (including the Cavan and Leitrim Railway) were closed by 1960. The (GNR) Virginia Road Station, from 1863 to 1958 serviced the Drogheda and Navan extension route to Kells and Oldcastle. Cooperation between the Cavan and Westmeath county councils is striving to integrate this into the national and regional development plan. Cavan railway station opened on 8 July 1856, closed for passenger services on 14 October 1957, and finally closed altogether on 1 January 1960. Bus Cavan's bus station is owned and operated by Bus Éireann and is located on Farnham Street. It is a single-storey accessible building with a ticket office, waiting room, public 'phone, restaurant and toilets. The station is served