TWO main factors have obstructed attempts to develop a Robin Hood industry in Nottinghamshire: external indifference... and indifference within the borders of what was once a shire of mighty oaks and flying arrows.

To deal first with matters external, it remains a mystery why, in the late 1980s, National Forest status was conferred not on the most obvious of five contenders – Sherwood Forest – but to a patch of land near Burton-on-Trent.

To this day you can mention "National Forest" to anyone who is not familiar with the unconvincing road signs on the A38 and shoulders will be shrugged.

A more recent setback was occasioned not by errors of official judgment but by ITV viewers who in 2005 voted to spend a National Lottery pot of £50m on building some cycle trails, not on more exciting projects with international appeal such as the proposed creation of a new tourist experience in Sherwood Forest. I'm a cyclist myself and I can tell you the United Kingdom is overloaded with places on which to get mud on the back of one's T-shirt. We only have one folk legend of the magnitude of Robin Hood and once again we blew the chance of making something of it.

As for internal indifference, it has historically been found in Nottingham itself, where the closest thing to a convincing stab at getting coin from the legend was the woefully cheesy Tales of Robin Hood.

The business was housed in an ugly concrete building in the ugly Maid Marian Way (in fairness, the city council sweats have recently improved the appearance of the highway). Every time I walked by I encountered parties of underwhelmed Spanish students who gave the impression that, on balance, they'd sooner be in Barcelona.

The thought that local officialdom and elements of the business community were suspicious of Robin was reinforced by bizarre choices of representative logos. We had a forgettable multi-coloured figure accompanying the motto "Our Style is Legendary" (our style may possibly be legendary... but it is not as legendary as our legend).

Then in an awesome triumph of imagination somebody thought Nottingham and Nottinghamshire might best be represented by... a capital N. Classy. It was almost as if nobody wanted Robin Hood turning up in case he had a Shirebrook accent.

Throughout all this, the What Shall We Do With Robin? debate continued with proposals of varying degrees of quality. Thank goodness, we now seem to have parked the once persistently expressed proposal that the allegedly disappointing Nottingham Castle should be dismantled stone by stone and replaced with a replica of the medieval fortress that once stood on the site.

I am not swayed by arguments that tourists are overcome with grief on discovering that Nottingham Castle is not a castle but a late 17th-Century mansion. If they can't be bothered to do their homework, tough. Lots of castles are not, in fact castles, and you won't see visitors to Hillsborough Castle in Northern Ireland or Chilham Castle in Kent suicidally looking for a moat in which to jump.

Besides, if buildings always have to look like their names, perhaps we should also make architectural adjustments to the big building at the eastern end of Old Market Square. I mean, the Council House is hardly a council house.

The best of recent contributions to the debate have come from Councillor Leon Unczur and the Sheriff's Commission. The Robin Hood Trail, linking the Castle, was a small but important first step and I like the proposal for a medieval village in the Castle Road area.

Of course South Nottingham College would have to be persuaded to educate its students elsewhere, but the bonus for the city would be the removal of the college's hideous buildings in a project that would not necessarily compromise the integrity of the castle site itself.

We are told by the chairman of the Castle Working Group that a medieval village is unlikely to be the next Robin Hood attraction in Nottingham but given that nothing on this scale is now likely to be built for many years it is a proposal that could be worked on until economic times improve and it becomes easier to attract private sector investment.

How sad that we are enduring the worst economic slump of our lifetimes.

At last Robin Hood is getting some overdue and sensible attention... but the prospect for immediate progress looks bleak.