diff --git a/src/c3nav/mapdata/api/base.py b/src/c3nav/mapdata/api/base.py
index ff172325..f73af6b0 100644
--- a/src/c3nav/mapdata/api/base.py
+++ b/src/c3nav/mapdata/api/base.py
@@ -1,6 +1,7 @@
 import json
 from functools import wraps
 
+from django.conf import settings
 from django.core.serializers.json import DjangoJSONEncoder
 from django.db.models import Prefetch
 from django.utils.cache import get_conditional_response
@@ -15,7 +16,7 @@ from c3nav.mapdata.models.locations import SpecificLocation
 from c3nav.mapdata.utils.cache.local import LocalCacheProxy
 from c3nav.mapdata.utils.cache.stats import increment_cache_key
 
-request_cache = LocalCacheProxy(maxsize=64)
+request_cache = LocalCacheProxy(maxsize=settings.CACHE_SIZE_API)
 
 
 def api_etag(permissions=True, etag_func=AccessPermission.etag_func, base_mapdata=False):
diff --git a/src/c3nav/mapdata/utils/locations.py b/src/c3nav/mapdata/utils/locations.py
index a76d9a02..2e3a3ba0 100644
--- a/src/c3nav/mapdata/utils/locations.py
+++ b/src/c3nav/mapdata/utils/locations.py
@@ -8,6 +8,7 @@ from itertools import chain
 from typing import Any, List, Mapping, Optional, Union
 
 from django.apps import apps
+from django.conf import settings
 from django.db.models import Prefetch, Q
 from django.utils.functional import cached_property
 from django.utils.translation import gettext_lazy as _
@@ -24,7 +25,7 @@ from c3nav.mapdata.utils.cache.local import LocalCacheProxy
 from c3nav.mapdata.utils.geometry import unwrap_geom
 from c3nav.mapdata.utils.models import get_submodels
 
-proxied_cache = LocalCacheProxy(maxsize=128)
+proxied_cache = LocalCacheProxy(maxsize=settings.CACHE_SIZE_LOCATIONS)
 
 
 def locations_for_request(request) -> Mapping[int, LocationSlug]:
diff --git a/src/c3nav/settings.py b/src/c3nav/settings.py
index 572cd6cf..85f08d29 100644
--- a/src/c3nav/settings.py
+++ b/src/c3nav/settings.py
@@ -155,6 +155,10 @@ ENABLE_MESH = config.getboolean('c3nav', 'enable_mesh', fallback=True, env='ENAB
 SERVE_ANYTHING = config.getboolean('c3nav', 'serve_anything', fallback=True, env='SERVE_ANYTHING')
 SERVE_API = config.getboolean('c3nav', 'serve_api', fallback=SERVE_ANYTHING, env='SERVE_API')
 
+# how many location lookups to cache in each worker's in-memory LRU cache proxy
+CACHE_SIZE_LOCATIONS = config.getint('c3nav', 'cache_size_locations', fallback=128)
+CACHE_SIZE_API = config.getint('c3nav', 'cache_size_api', fallback=64)
+
 RENDER_SCALE = config.getfloat('c3nav', 'render_scale', fallback=20.0)
 IMAGE_RENDERER = config.get('c3nav', 'image_renderer', fallback='svg')
 SVG_RENDERER = config.get('c3nav', 'svg_renderer', fallback='rsvg-convert')