Establishing A Collaborative Planning Procedure for the European XFEL

Building a new accelerator requires a consistent common design of the entire complex, including machine, tunnels, buildings and infrastructure. The efforts involve experts from many disciplines. A dedicated planning and design procedure has to be established which provides “just-enough” details where needed while preserving maximum flexibility for ongoing R&D efforts, and which can also manage later changes if they become necessary. The paper presents experience from establishing such a collaborative planning process for the European XFEL.