The Campus Garching (German: Hochschul- und Forschungszentrum Garching) is a campus of the Technical University of Munich and a number of other research institutes, located around 10 km north of Munich in Garching. At the same time, it constitutes a district of the city. With more than 7,500 employees and around 17,000 students, it is one of the largest centers for science, research and teaching in Germany.[1][2]
The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich has numerous facilities on the Campus Garching, including seven chairs of the Faculty of Physics and sections of the Faculty of Geology.
Max Planck Society
Four research institutes of the Max Planck Society operate on the Campus Garching:
In recent years, the Garching campus has started developing into a campus university. In 2019, a new €45 million canteen opened, capable of serving 7,300 meals a day.[6] The first student residences are currently in construction.[7]
A 36,000 m2 multipurpose building named GALILEO is in the final stages of construction. When completed, it will house offices, stores, restaurants, a church, a hotel and convention center, and guest apartments.[8]GALILEO is being developed as a public–private partnership between the state of Bavaria and private investors.
The Hochschul- und Forschungszentrum Garching is a district of the city of Garching, rather than a single legal entity. It is located on the left bank of the Isar, about 2 to 3 kilometers northeast of Garching's city center, about 17 kilometers north-northeast of the city center of Munich, and about 16 kilometers southwest of Munich Airport. Located in the Munich gravel plain, the campus' elevation is flat throughout.
For a long time, accessibility to the campus by public transport was problematic. The Technical University of Munich operated its own shuttle bus between its main campus and the Garching campus. Public buses ran from the Studentenstadt U-Bahn station, and later from Garching-Hochbrück. Those who missed the last bus in the early evening had to rely on hitchhiking to get home, which earned the campus the nicknames Garchosibirsk and Novogarchinsk.[10]
Since 2006, the campus has been connected to the Munich U-Bahn network with the Garching-Forschungszentrum station, with an interval of 5 minutes during rush hour.[11] It takes around half an hour to get to the city center.
History
The research reactorFRM I, nicknamed the atomic egg, has become a landmark of the city of Garching, even being featured in its coat of arms.
In 1957, the first German research reactor, the 4 MW Forschungsreaktor München [de], marked the beginning of the Garching campus. In operation until 2000, its domed building in the shape of an "atomic egg" became a landmark of the city of Garching, and has been listed as a historical monument.[12] Located right next to it, its successor Forschungsreaktor München II has been in operation since 2004.