The M53 runs from the A55 Chester Bypass to Wallasey up the Wirral Peninsula. It continues as a non-motorway into the Mersey Tunnels leading to Liverpool City Centre. It is sometimes called the "Mid Wirral Motorway".
The first section to be built was an upgrade of the roads around the Vauxhall motor plant initially as an unclassified non-motorway road.
In 1972, the northern section of the M53 from junctions 1 & 5 opened in conjunction with the construction of the Mersey Tunnels.
The unclassified industrial road was upgraded and extended to meet the A5117 in October 1974, and was numbered as the M531. This was further extended to meet the M56 and upto the A56 at Chester.
The original route of the M53 called for a western bypass of Little & Great Sutton. With the upgrade of the eastern M531, it was then decided to abandon plans for the western route and renumber the whole motorway as the M53. West of junction 5 there is an unfinished junction built for the continuation of the original M53 route.