Abstract: A method of planning communication links in a telecommunication system comprising a plurality of cells inside each of which is a ground station, in which system communications are effected via the ground stations and relay equipment carried by a constellation of satellites. Each of the satellites has a plurality of antennas and each of the antennas is adapted to remain pointed toward a ground station. Continuity of communications for each ground station is assured by switching the communications from one satellite to another satellite. For planning communication links over a particular programming time, graphs of intervals for the ground stations are used in which each node of a graph is an interval of potential use of equipment on board a satellite and each line is a pair of intervals having portions overlapping in time.