As one of only two significant towns on the route of the Ulster Canal, Monaghan town was a significant point on the canal. It is also the location of the Ulster Canal Greenway, a greenway on an industrial heritage feature that, like the canal restoration, features the canal in name only and like the New Ulster Canal, is so devoid of industrial heritage that it should have been built elsewhere.
The town was also a significant location on the railway network, being located on the line from Armagh City to Clones, giving the town excellent connections to Belfast and to the midlands of Ireland. The former railway station building and goods store remain in the town, at the second station to have existed here (the first was closed after the railway was extended to Clones). The station building is now adaptively reused as a business centre and the goods store as a retail outlet.
The town is also the location of the only canal tunnel in Ireland. This feature is partially demolished at its western end and advocates of the New Ulster Canal would prefer that the remainder follow suit.
As a summit level canal, the Ulster Canal was fed primarily from the Quiglough Reservoir near Monaghan town. This much diminished feature is now in use as a public water supply.