diff --git a/config.c b/config.c
index d2fc8f5f2..790405a21 100644
--- a/config.c
+++ b/config.c
@@ -636,10 +636,7 @@ int git_config(config_fn_t fn, void *data)
 	char *repo_config = NULL;
 	const char *home = NULL;
 
-	/* $GIT_CONFIG makes git read _only_ the given config file,
-	 * $GIT_CONFIG_LOCAL will make it process it in addition to the
-	 * global config file, the same way it would the per-repository
-	 * config file otherwise. */
+	/* Setting $GIT_CONFIG makes git read _only_ the given config file. */
 	if (config_exclusive_filename)
 		return git_config_from_file(fn, config_exclusive_filename, data);
 	if (git_config_system() && !access(git_etc_gitconfig(), R_OK))
diff --git a/git-svn.perl b/git-svn.perl
index 2c206e917..ad01e182d 100755
--- a/git-svn.perl
+++ b/git-svn.perl
@@ -5015,8 +5015,7 @@ sub minimize_connections {
 		}
 	}
 	if (@emptied) {
-		my $file = $ENV{GIT_CONFIG} || $ENV{GIT_CONFIG_LOCAL} ||
-		           "$ENV{GIT_DIR}/config";
+		my $file = $ENV{GIT_CONFIG} || "$ENV{GIT_DIR}/config";
 		print STDERR <<EOF;
 The following [svn-remote] sections in your config file ($file) are empty
 and can be safely removed:
diff --git a/t/t5400-send-pack.sh b/t/t5400-send-pack.sh
index da69f087b..b21317d68 100755
--- a/t/t5400-send-pack.sh
+++ b/t/t5400-send-pack.sh
@@ -99,7 +99,7 @@ test_expect_success \
 	! test -f victim/.git/refs/heads/extra
 '
 
-unset GIT_CONFIG GIT_CONFIG_LOCAL
+unset GIT_CONFIG
 HOME=`pwd`/no-such-directory
 export HOME ;# this way we force the victim/.git/config to be used.
 
diff --git a/t/test-lib.sh b/t/test-lib.sh
index 8936173ee..22ed448d5 100644
--- a/t/test-lib.sh
+++ b/t/test-lib.sh
@@ -471,7 +471,6 @@ PATH=$TEST_DIRECTORY/..:$PATH
 GIT_EXEC_PATH=$(pwd)/..
 GIT_TEMPLATE_DIR=$(pwd)/../templates/blt
 unset GIT_CONFIG
-unset GIT_CONFIG_LOCAL
 GIT_CONFIG_NOSYSTEM=1
 GIT_CONFIG_NOGLOBAL=1
 export PATH GIT_EXEC_PATH GIT_TEMPLATE_DIR GIT_CONFIG_NOSYSTEM GIT_CONFIG_NOGLOBAL