A slightly shorter pipe line was secured by crossing the river, building the reservoir (a substantial concrete-lined and vaulted-over structure) on the opposite bank, laying out the pipe line to follow that bank nearly to the city, and finally crossing back again; but the result has been that since the flood of August, 1909, in which the river crossings were destroyed, the reservoir remains isolated on the other side of the river from town, though intended to form part of the permanent works and act as a compensating reservoir for equalizing the pressure of the high-pressure system. Fortunately, the pumping station, the larger pumps, and the boilers, had been moved up the bank (after a rapid rise in the river on August 10th, 1909) to the new wells established by Mr. Conway on the line of the proposed prolongation of the infiltration gallery. The reservoir, however, is left to stand alone on the other side of the river, and its usefulness will not be restored until a new line is laid across the river, re-establishing its connection with the new pump line and the new and permanent pipe line to be laid along the north bank from the pumping station to the city. This will free Monterrey from the constant menace of a water famine. At present its two main water supplies may be cut off by unexpected floods like those of 1909 and 1910, as both supplies are carried across the river, and though only the cast-iron pipe connecting with the water supply from Estanzuela was carried away by the flood, the concrete conduit of the San Geronimo low-pressure supply was seriously threatened. Such risks are too great to be carried for any length of time; besides, a succession of dry years would cause such a reduction in the Estanzuela supply as to require an additional reserve in the way of pumping stations drawing on the under-flow of the river, such as already exists in San Geronimo. Afterward, Messrs. Schuyler and Binckley submitted preliminary plans and profiles for the projected concrete gravity conduit from Estanzuela to the reservoir south of the city, and Mr. Binckley submitted excavation plans for two reservoirs, only one of which was built, and from designs by Mr. Conway. Stephen E. Kieffer, M. Am. Soc. C. E., was intrusted by Mr. Binckley with the revision of the plans of the water distribution and sewers. The southern half was approved by the Government and executed according to his plans; the northern part was afterward revised by Mr. Conway and has been partly built.