I doubt that would have helped......
This area is normally under 35-40 ft of water. There isn't even any mud, and the brush is quickly growing. We have Mexican Sycamore, Juniper, Mesquite, Acacia, Datura, and many other plants sprouting up in the old channel, and it's a big habitat for wildlife (including fahr aintz!).
I'm standing in the riverbed at the north end of Medina Lake in the Medina River bed. The big issue is that those cracks you see in the ground are over 13.5" deep. It'll take a major tropical downpour to change this. Unfortunately, that downpour will have to happen in your neck of the woods and the watershed to the north of us. It'll cause a lot of property damage. In the last couple of years, people have been building further and further into the flood zone here.