Ford Road serves as the zero-mile line for the Detroit area's Mile Road System. From the Canton Center Road intersection eastward, all of M-153 is a part of the National Highway System, a network of roads important to the country's economy, defense, and mobility. M-153 is maintained by the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) like other state highways in Michigan. As a part of these maintenance responsibilities, the department tracks the volume of traffic that uses the roadways under its jurisdiction. These volumes are expressed using a metric called annual average daily traffic, which is a statistical calculation of the average daily number of vehicles on a segment of roadway. MDOT's surveys in 2010 showed that the highest traffic levels along M-153 were the 64,956 vehicles daily between the River Rouge and the Southfield Freeway in Dearborn; the lowest counts were the 10,380 vehicles per day between Plymouth Road and the end of the expressway in Superior Township.