Index: subversion/bindings/swig/core.i
===================================================================
--- subversion/bindings/swig/core.i	(revision 16458)
+++ subversion/bindings/swig/core.i	(working copy)
@@ -635,11 +635,6 @@
 PyObject *svn_swig_py_register_cleanup(PyObject *py_pool, apr_pool_t *pool);
 
 %init %{
-/* Theoretically, we should be checking for errors from these calls,
-   but I do not know of any useful way to signal an error to Python
-   from within a module initialization function. */
-apr_initialize();
-atexit(apr_terminate);
 
 /* This is a hack.  I dunno if we can count on SWIG calling the module "m" */
 PyModule_AddObject(m, "SubversionException", 
Index: subversion/bindings/swig/python/libsvn_swig_py/swigutil_py.c
===================================================================
--- subversion/bindings/swig/python/libsvn_swig_py/swigutil_py.c	(revision 16458)
+++ subversion/bindings/swig/python/libsvn_swig_py/swigutil_py.c	(working copy)
@@ -66,12 +66,24 @@
 static apr_threadkey_t *_saved_thread_key = NULL;
 static apr_pool_t *_saved_thread_pool = NULL;
 #endif
+static int apr_initialized = 0;
 
 void svn_swig_py_release_py_lock(void)
 {
 #ifdef ACQUIRE_PYTHON_LOCK
   PyThreadState *thread_state;
+#endif
 
+  if (!apr_initialized) {
+    /* Theoretically, we should be checking for errors from these calls,
+       but I do not know of any useful way to signal an error to Python
+       from here. */
+    apr_initialize();
+    atexit(apr_terminate);
+    apr_initialized = 1;
+  }
+
+#ifdef ACQUIRE_PYTHON_LOCK
   if (_saved_thread_key == NULL) {
     /* Obviously, creating a top-level pool for this is pretty stupid. */
     apr_pool_create(&_saved_thread_pool, NULL);