diff --git a/doc/requirements.txt b/doc/requirements.txt
deleted file mode 100644
index 77873540b..000000000
--- a/doc/requirements.txt
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,10 +0,0 @@
-# The order of packages is significant, because pip processes them in the order
-# of appearance. Changing the order has an impact on the overall integration
-# process, which may cause wedges in the gate later.
-
-# this is required for the docs build jobs
-sphinx>=2.0.0 # BSD
-openstackdocstheme>=1.29.2 # Apache-2.0
-reno>=2.11.3 # Apache-2.0
-doc8>=0.8.0 # Apache-2.0
-bashate>=0.6.0 # Apache-2.0
diff --git a/doc/requirements.txt b/doc/requirements.txt
new file mode 120000
index 000000000..3cfb341d4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/doc/requirements.txt
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+../molecule-requirements.txt
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/doc/source/_exts/.gitkeep b/doc/source/_exts/.gitkeep
deleted file mode 100644
index e69de29bb..000000000
diff --git a/molecule-requirements.txt b/molecule-requirements.txt
index a2654554b..aae2cbfd0 100644
--- a/molecule-requirements.txt
+++ b/molecule-requirements.txt
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+# this is required for the molecule jobs
 ansible
 ansi2html
 docker
@@ -7,3 +8,10 @@ pytest-html
 pytest-xdist
 mock
 molecule>=2.22rc1
+
+# this is required for the docs build jobs
+sphinx>=2.0.0 # BSD
+openstackdocstheme>=1.29.2 # Apache-2.0
+reno>=2.11.3 # Apache-2.0
+doc8>=0.8.0 # Apache-2.0
+bashate>=0.6.0 # Apache-2.0
diff --git a/tox.ini b/tox.ini
index e76528cdc..29924b5bb 100644
--- a/tox.ini
+++ b/tox.ini
@@ -96,8 +96,7 @@ commands =
 [testenv:docs]
 basepython = python3
 deps =
-  -r{toxinidir}/doc/requirements.txt
-  -r{toxinidir}/molecule-requirements.txt
+  -r {toxinidir}/doc/requirements.txt
 commands=
     doc8 doc
     sphinx-build -a -E -W -d doc/build/doctrees -b html doc/source doc/build/html -T