A good and encyclopedic picture, but fails at least two FP criteria:
It is of a moderate, not high, technical standard: the image is either somewhat grainy (it's hard to see against the desert background but is readily visible against the blue sky background at the top) or has compression artifacts (for example, at 525,20), has what seem to be areas of discoloration (light streak near 470,320 and gray spot at 625,680) and white spots (at 95,430; 575,300; 385,85), and has various streaks (most clearly visible in the upper one-fifth of the image).
At 664 × 830 pixels, it is not of sufficiently high resolution.
Delist Size matters, and this is neither unique not high-quality enough to consider overlooking that problem. Shoemaker's HolidayOver 201 FCs served 15:02, 27 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Comment a shame really I remember this image on the main page really caught my attention, I had no idea this massive irrigation network even exists. It's pretty unique too, I mean, who is going to hire a flight over an aqueduct just to take a sharp, high resolution image of it? I guess it's not as classy as a head of cabbage. Is this part of a large scale plan to delist anything which met the requirements at the time but is not up to current standard? --Uncle Bungle (talk) 21:45, 29 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
There has been some considerable discussion about this re-evaluating of older images on current standards before - some are strongly against it, some rather for it, and many evaluate on a case by case basis. In this case given Black Falcon isn't exactly an FPC regular I don't think you could say it's 'part of a plan', but indirectly it does tend to be gradually happening. You're always welcome to express your opinion in terms of a 'Keep' vote. --jjron (talk) 12:08, 30 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
There may be a gradual movement toward re-evaluating old FPs, as jjron notes, but as this is my first foray into FPC, I am unaware of any short- or long-term plans that may or may not be in place or under discussion. I agree that it's unlikely that any Wikipedia editor will take a better image, at least in the near future; however, it is quite a bit more likely that the same government agency that took this picture, the United States Bureau of Reclamation, has already produced or will produce another photo of the Central Arizona Project. More generally, I think that changes in FP standards—for better or for worse, it depends on one's perspective—come naturally as Wikipedia evolves. –BLACK FALCON(TALK) 18:24, 30 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
In that case, Keep on the grounds that it met the technical standards at the time, has considerable EV for the subject, is unlikely to be re-produced by a wikipedian and no government made alternative (which is suspected to exist) has been presented to take its place. --Uncle Bungle (talk) 22:07, 30 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delist per nom. MER-C 07:49, 1 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Delisted --jjron (talk) 12:42, 3 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]
