CRANSTON — Amid heavy opposition from neighbors and city officials, the Providence firm that proposed a big-box retail development on the site of the Mulligan’s Island golf complex has abandoned its plans.

A lawyer for the developer, Churchill & Banks, faxed letters to the mayor’s office and the city Planning Department yesterday afternoon withdrawing the company’s application for city approvals.

The letter did not offer an explanation for the withdrawal and company officials did not return calls for comment.

But the project, which was to include a BJ’s Wholesale Club as the anchor tenant, became a lightning rod for criticism after neighbors concerned about traffic and the loss of golf course greenery organized against it.

Mayor Michael T. Napolitano said the developer, even after recent revisions meant to allay the neighbors’ concerns, was destined to fail.

“There was no conceivable set of facts which could let this project go forward,” he said.

Rachel McNally, president of the opposition group Save Cranston’s Open Space, said the withdrawal was “a victory for the citizens of Cranston.”

But she said neighbors would remain vigilant.

“We know this doesn’t mean Churchill & Banks, or some other developer, won’t come back with another proposal,” McNally said.

The future of the 55-acre property on New London Avenue is, indeed, in doubt.

Michael Friedman, a principal of Warren-based Gemini Partners, which owns Mulligan’s Island, said yesterday that he would reach out to other developers who had expressed interest in the property.

But he acknowledged those developers would have “reason for caution” after the death of the Churchill & Banks proposal.

“That’s really the sad part … the politics of the whole thing eclipsed the interests of the city,” he said.

Friedman argued that Cranston lost a chance to enhance its tax base and erect a more permanent barrier against expansion of the state prison complex that abuts Mulligan’s Island.

Expansion has long been feared, and opposed, by neighbors and city officials. But Tracey Z. Poole, spokeswoman for the Department of Corrections, said there are no imminent plans to enlarge the complex, which includes a men’s medium security prison and women’s minimum- and medium-security prisons.

Churchill & Banks, headed by Richard Baccari, filed plans in April for a development that would include two big-box stores and three smaller commercial buildings on the property.

Neighbors quickly organized to defeat the project.

And in July, the developer’s representatives went door to door with a scaled-down version of the so-called Centre at Garden Hills, dropping one of the two big-box stores but keeping a total of five buildings in place.

Churchill & Banks also pledged to give about 20 acres of open space to the city and offered small patches of land to abutters to serve as buffers.

But neighbors and politicians remained opposed.

With a key Planning Commission meeting approaching, Churchill & Banks attempted to soften that opposition by collecting petitions, signed by dozens of residents outside the immediate neighborhood, supporting the project.

Baccari also sent letters to the mayor and City Council members urging them to look beyond “the group that screams the loudest,” meaning the neighbors, and “consider our project as it is a responsible development for Cranston.”

BJ’s, which has stores in Coventry, Johnston and Middletown, distributed letters to customers, encouraging them to call the City Council, Planning Commission and mayor and lobby for support.

And Construction and General Laborers’ Local Union 271 in Providence drafted letters to members urging them to press City Council members for support of the project.

But the mayor, who walked the area around Mulligan’s Island from June to September surveying neighbors on the proposed development, remained opposed.

And City Council members, who would have to sign off on any project, still appeared cool to the idea.

Jeffrey P. Barone, the council member who represents the area and has long opposed the project, said the neighborhood opposition was ultimately responsible for killing the project.

“If they didn’t do what they did, you would have never seen the company do what they did,” he said.

dscharfe@projo.com