Tourism boosters in the Scenic City had reason to smile earlier this week when The New York Times published a travel piece highlighting some of Chattanooga's attractions and restaurants.

The press coverage is hitting the West Coast, too, with the Los Angeles Times set to publish another travel article on the city in the coming week or two, according to a Chattanooga Area Convention and Visitors Bureau official.

Over the past two weeks, the city has hosted writers with the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Better Homes & Gardens and Southern Living, among others, and all have come because Chattanooga remains a major family vacation destination, said Candice Davis, marketing and public relations manager for the visitors bureau.

"I've been here for three years, so I was here before the whole waterfront development happened, and I've seen the increase in the amount of journalists that have had interest in Chattanooga," Ms. Davis said.

The city's $120 million 21st Century Waterfront, which includes the Ross's Landing Pier, The Passage memorial and expansions of the Tennessee Aquarium and Hunter Museum of American Art, was completed last year.

Some writers come through tours arranged by a public relations firm hired by the visitors bureau. At the end of this month, the bureau is hosting one of those trips, with writers from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Tallahassee (Fla.) Democrat, National Geographic Traveler, Southern Hospitality, Country Living and a few in-flight airline magazines.

The bureau pays Tallahassee-based Geiger & Associates $94,000 a year to find journalists to come, and in turn, the media coverage reached an estimated 7.6 million people this past year, Ms. Davis said. The bureau estimates the coverage was equal to $390,000 in advertising.

The tours include visits to the aquarium, the Hunter Museum, Rock City, Ruby Falls, Lake Winnepesaukah, the Incline Railway, the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park, the Chattanooga Choo-Choo and the downtown waterfront.

Events such as the Nightfall concert series also are promoted.

"Sometimes it's hard to sell people about Chattanooga until they see it," Ms. Davis said. "We try to give them a bit of everything, promoting Chattanooga on the cultural side, as well as the fun."

Other writers, including those who wrote The New York Times and Los Angeles Times pieces, come unannounced and conduct their business incognito.

Harold Goldberg, a freelancer who wrote the New York Times article, said he pitched his story because he knows some friends from the area, and the Times had a particular interest in stories about smaller cities.

His article, which provided suggestions on what to do with 36 hours in the city, called Chattanooga "the undiscovered gem of Tennessee, where old-school Southern manners and grand Victorian mansions meet a thoroughly modern, eco-friendly Tennessee riverfront."

The only negative of his trip? Finding a cockroach in his motel room, he said.

"But 99 percent of the trip was enjoyable," Mr. Goldberg said. "I think you'll agree that I had a fine time just from the tone of the story."