BERKELEY, Calif. -- UC Berkeley officials have made two major concessions they hope will finally remove a group of tree-sitters from an on-campus oak grove and allow the construction of an athletic training facility adjacent to Memorial Stadium.

In court papers filed Friday, the university agreed to cancel all non-football events at Memorial Stadium and drop plans to attach a concrete support beam to the stadium's west wall. Both concessions were made to quell concerns by a local neighborhood group and the city of Berkeley over seismic safety.

The active Hayward Fault runs right down the middle of the stadium.

The university asked in return that Judge Barbara Miller immediately lift an injunction that prevents the university from removing the tree-sitters and begin construction on the new facility.

Miller issued a mixed court ruling last week which keeps in place an injunction against the project that she issued on Jan. 29, 2007, which bars the university from going ahead with its proposed $140 million, 158,000-square-foot project for now.

But UC-Berkeley officials say they believe Miller's ruling opens the door for them to begin the project sometime in the near future, saying that they can resolve the few remaining concerns expressed by the judge.

The plaintiffs in the case are the city of Berkeley, the California Oak Foundation and the Panoramic Hill Association, which represents people who live near the football stadium.

They filed suit in December of 2006, shortly after a UC Board of Regents committee approved building a training center next to the university's football stadium.

In a separate but related action, a small but dedicated group of people have been living in a grove of oak trees next to the stadium to protest the project because it calls for tearing down the trees.

UC-Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof said that in its legal response, the university is removing its provision to hold up to seven capacity, non-football events at the football stadium.

Instead, the university will continue the policy and practice that have been in place since 1974, he said.

Mogulof said the university has also told the court that it will not be placing a new grade beam on the stadium's foundation during construction of the new training facility.

In addition, he said, the university provided information to Miller supporting its contention that two other elements of the training center she had determined to be alterations to the stadium are no longer included in the design, and in fact haven't been for quite a while.

Mogulof said that now that the university has decided to remove the last remaining construction element, the grade beam, deemed to be an alteration to the stadium, the university is suggesting that there no longer exists any need for Miller to further consider how or if she should arrive at a valuation for the stadium.

Mogulof said university officials believe that Miller's ruling that the training center is a separate structure from the stadium essentially makes the valuation issue a moot point in connection with the first phase of the project.

Miller hasn't yet indicated if she wants to hold another hearing or if she will issue her final ruling based solely on the new legal papers filed by both sides this week.

Stephen Volker, the attorney for the California Oak Foundation, said on Wednesday that the plaintiffs sent Miller a letter saying they would be happy to have another hearing if the judge thinks it would be productive.

Mogulof said the university continues to estimate that only seven people remain in the grove of oak trees and all of them reside in a single tree.

He said that as part of a policy initiated on Thursday, campus police provided the remaining protesters with water and energy bars.

Mogulof said the university is imploring the remaining tree-sitters to come down voluntarily.