diff --git a/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/context/DatasetLifecycleManager.java b/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/context/DatasetLifecycleManager.java
index 9de8f73..f25e4f6 100644
--- a/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/context/DatasetLifecycleManager.java
+++ b/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/context/DatasetLifecycleManager.java
@@ -18,6 +18,8 @@
  */
 package org.apache.asterix.common.context;
 
+import static org.apache.asterix.common.metadata.MetadataIndexImmutableProperties.METADATA_DATASETS_PARTITIONS;
+
 import java.io.IOException;
 import java.io.OutputStream;
 import java.util.ArrayList;
@@ -33,6 +35,7 @@
 import org.apache.asterix.common.dataflow.DatasetLocalResource;
 import org.apache.asterix.common.exceptions.ACIDException;
 import org.apache.asterix.common.ioopcallbacks.AbstractLSMIOOperationCallback;
+import org.apache.asterix.common.metadata.MetadataIndexImmutableProperties;
 import org.apache.asterix.common.replication.IReplicationStrategy;
 import org.apache.asterix.common.storage.DatasetResourceReference;
 import org.apache.asterix.common.storage.IIndexCheckpointManagerProvider;
@@ -237,8 +240,10 @@
             dsr = datasets.get(did);
             if (dsr == null) {
                 DatasetInfo dsInfo = new DatasetInfo(did);
+                int partitions = MetadataIndexImmutableProperties.isMetadataDataset(did) ? METADATA_DATASETS_PARTITIONS
+                        : numPartitions;
                 DatasetVirtualBufferCaches vbcs = new DatasetVirtualBufferCaches(did, storageProperties,
-                        memoryManager.getNumPages(did), numPartitions);
+                        memoryManager.getNumPages(did), partitions);
                 dsr = new DatasetResource(dsInfo, vbcs);
                 datasets.put(did, dsr);
             }
diff --git a/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/metadata/MetadataIndexImmutableProperties.java b/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/metadata/MetadataIndexImmutableProperties.java
index 8b4c779..2d6bb17 100644
--- a/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/metadata/MetadataIndexImmutableProperties.java
+++ b/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/metadata/MetadataIndexImmutableProperties.java
@@ -19,14 +19,15 @@
 package org.apache.asterix.common.metadata;
 
 public class MetadataIndexImmutableProperties {
+
+    public static final int FIRST_AVAILABLE_EXTENSION_METADATA_DATASET_ID = 52;
+    public static final int FIRST_AVAILABLE_USER_DATASET_ID = 100;
+    public static final int METADATA_DATASETS_PARTITIONS = 1;
+
     private final String indexName;
     private final int datasetId;
     private final long resourceId;
 
-    // TODO(till? should we reconsider these numbers?!)
-    public static final int FIRST_AVAILABLE_EXTENSION_METADATA_DATASET_ID = 52;
-    public static final int FIRST_AVAILABLE_USER_DATASET_ID = 100;
-
     public MetadataIndexImmutableProperties(String indexName, int datasetId, long resourceId) {
         this.indexName = indexName;
         this.datasetId = datasetId;