diff --git a/src/common/hostlist.c b/src/common/hostlist.c
index 9b7df111b71035530a6ff8cda5e6682a2e17f4ba..2cea5d694d62fe38c2ec1f19a94f5e994b640aa5 100644
--- a/src/common/hostlist.c
+++ b/src/common/hostlist.c
@@ -281,10 +281,6 @@ struct _range {
 char *alpha_num = "0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ";
 enum {A, B, C, D};
 
-#ifndef SYSTEM_DIMENSIONS
-#  define SYSTEM_DIMENSIONS 1
-#endif
-
 /* logic for block node description */
 
 /* to speed things up we will do some calculations once to avoid